Album cover

I thought that I would add some pics of a project that took up many months of last year - a photo album for my dear friend Debs who was moving over to sunny Oz and I wanted some her to have something special to remember us by.

So I set about a project! I eventually settled on a theme which was England (as a reminder of home) - and after many ideas that just didnt cut it, I went for the 'green man of the forest' with the links to old England, and the 'green and pleasant land'. For the front piece I used a 'created ' fabric from paper and lightly needlefelt wool, which I then machine stitched to hold it all together. I cut the piece into squares and then stitched them together again to get a 'trellis' effect. The green man was made using needlefelting techniques and surrounded with stitched leaves so that he appears to come 'out of the woods'

The back was enormous fun! I used a paper bag as the base, which I painted, stitched, embossed and waxed to within an inch of its life using metal threads, metalic paint and huge quantities of elbow grease! Eventually this was treated with what felt like a million layers of pva to protect it and to stop the paper shredding.

I put it put together to form the cover of a shop-bought photo album with a stitched 'backbone' which I lightly stamped with some text so it looked like an old book. I handed it over to my friend at her 'goodbye bbq' last summer! She was delighted with it and I keep promising to put together another book detailing how I made the first one. This was originally the plan behind 'Foam' - which was to be a book cover for a book about a book cover! However, as I sold that after the exhibition, I guess I will have to go back to the drawing board again this year and start again. How terrible ;)