judyisokay

Steal Like @austinkleon! Nooner with @aigaaustin & @adfedaustin

I've been following Austin author, Austin Kleon on twitter for a while. Living his book tour life through tweets and his blog as he steals across America. Steal Like an Artist, his latest book is now on the New York Time's best seller list. I was so pleased to see his tweet this month that his book tour had finally landed in his hometown here in Austin at Book People. I grabbed the kiddo and headed to see his talk and get a copy signed for her. Rather than reading from his book, he took us on a journey with him through slides and a full circle of his life as an author. Really good stuff. If you haven't visited his blog, it's great and he really shares his creative life there. Austin, thanks for inspiring me and the little one.  If you missed him, I hear on June 27th, there will be a joint event "nooner" at the Alamo Drafthouse with AIGAAustin and Adfed. It will be a treat to see and hear him again.

World's Most Expensive Book?

Next week Christie's will be auctioning off a first edition copy of "The Birds of America"by John James Audubon. This massive book (4 volumes in the set) contain 435 hand-colored prints. It is a merging of science and art which boggles the mind. Tom Lecky, head of books at Christie's said "His ambition to do this monumental project has made the book the most valuable in the world and made his name known throughout the world as a great observer of nature." Audubon insisted in exacting production and that each bird be printed life-size which required the largest paper available at the time. He chose aquatint printing rather than lithography. Using aquatint printing produced more detailed gradiations though it was a more expensive process. The four volumes were printed in 1838 at a total cost of $115,640. It was a 200-copy run. Only 120 complete sets are believed to exist. The last copy fetched $11.5 million. More in this article from The Daily Beast.

BookBinding with AIGA

Had a blast with the AIGA Chapter of Austin Community College making books this weekend. There were so many great looking books created.  We hand distressed hardboard covers and then coptic stitched in our pages. A real treat.

Rock Paper Show

Buy this book. 312 pages. 566 color images. It is curated by my fine friend, DECODER RING dude and president of the AMERICAN POSTER INSTITUTE, Geoff Peveto. The book officially will be released in June and documents FLATSTOCK, API's ongoing rock poster exhibit seen annually at SXSW here in Austin. It features interviews, essays by artists, collectors and bands. Packed with gorgeous full color music posters on a variety of paper stocks. See more about the book at the Rock Paper Show website HERE. Can't wait to get my hands on my own copy.

Binding Goodness

I am always looking for different types of bindery. Stumbled onto this book with rollabind like discs for binding. Found it while looking for printed samples of FRENCH PAPER, CONSTRUCTION. This gorgeous project is printed on Safety Orange, 100 Cover. Construction comes in nine colors and three whites. They're 100% recycled and acid free. I saw this from MYNDOLOGY and ordered it up immediately along with some silver metal discs. I was so happy to see it arrive in the mail yesterday. The arrows you see are actually "laser cut".  And the piece was designed by Duffy and Partners. Can you say awesome??? Can't wait to buy the punch.

Custom Pocket Notebooks by YOU!

 Have you ever wanted to make your very own pocket notebook? At this new, website:  Scout Books  you can do just that! In just a few easy steps you can have a 32-page pocket-sized beauty on its way to you. The papers are 100% recycled and the cover is heavy chipboard.  The interior pages can be blank, lined or with a grid. Printed in genuine offset and shipped to you in 7 to 12 days.  A great idea for a client giveaway.