Design on the fly days 1 and 2

 .....so here i have set out to break down a common situation in the bindery.   That is, designing work on a short deadline.

I need a full leather clamshell box with a design across the cover using onlays in 4 days .

Having done this a number of times I know this can be completed, following a strict timetable ....

so here goes ......

The first 2 days should be devoted to completing the box itself, a full leather, double walled clamshell. In order to begin this I`ve first got to work out what base colour I'm going to use - the colour of bookcloth or leather for the trays, and the colour, or colours, of the skin used for the case. 

If there is artwork on the dustjacket, the brief dictates that I should make something in harmony, or that plays, borrows or expands on that of the cover. 

In this case the main body of colour from the dustjacket is a dark blue, so I'm going to go with that...

Whilst making the box, all the while I'm thinking about what I'm going to do.....

Immediately, I'm drawn to the clouds of green and orange in the bottom left corners of the jacket, and am totally ignoring the giant space turtle carrying discworld!!!!!!

Focusing on these green and orange clouds I decide the way forward is to dye some fair goat .

2 large pieces are used, 1 is dyed with a textured base of greens and blues, and the second with yellows and oranges. 

But this on its own is not interesting enough.  A simple way to transform a fairly ordinary, dyed goatskin for onlays, is to use a batik or craquele technique. A resist is used, cracked, and the piece dyed again (in this instance using dark blues and greens as a second colour).

When dry, the resist is removed to reveal the dark veining and marbling across the skin .

This is a good way to tie in the colours together .......

So, on the second day after completing the box, and casing it in, I have enough time at the end of the day to sketch out some initial ideas for designs and decide how I'm going to use the dyed goat that Nancy and I made earlier that day.  It was easy to do and too much fun!

Scribbling away a load of sketches and putting them up on a wall next to the material to be onlaid a pattern emerges .....

A quick and easy solution is to recreate the marbling and veining effect on the onlays, across the cover using sharp angular lines, with single line pallets.... I make some initial drawings, before drawing out a final design ......

I say quick and easy, but I know the tooling is going to be laborious