I was asked a few weeks ago to make some up cycled book crafts for our local library’s annual used book sale. I tried to come up with a wide array of uses for old books, things that would appeal to a larger audience. 

This banner / bunting was made from the pages of an old Black Beauty book. First I applied the pages to card stock using spray adhesive and then cut them out in the banner shapes. I folded a piece of ribbon in half and used a sewing machine to sew the banner pieces into place: 

I love these old illustrations. They would be a fun decoration for a party or bedroom decor for a child who loves horses:

Pages of the same book applied to a composition book:

I made bookmarks using old book pages. 

I folded them into thirds and then stitched the borders using a sewing machine. 

Alphabet stamps and other stamps are an easy way to add interest and personalize them:

This is a wood canvas I applied pages to using matte medium which is like a glue and sealer all in one. I stamped the saying onto the top using another set of alphabet stamps. The house stamp is the same one I used in this tutorial. 

Envelopes I made using a large assortment of old book pages:

Hand-made doilies. 

You can make any kind of paper into a doily using this cool circular paper punch:

They are fun to package them into themed packs like this:

This is probably my favorite project…a journal made out of an old book. I took more photos so I’ll try to do a full tutorial in a few days:

I made this “found poetry” book out of an old Readers’ Digest Condensed Book. I just spray-painted the cover and added the title:

I create poems using words in the text…they are usually called “blackout poetry”:

So many cool things you can make with old books…I just recommend trying to find the ones that are falling apart so that a perfectly good book isn’t pulled apart. I also love art journaling with old books which you can see here in this old post from the past

I’ve been working on revamping my art studio. It’s always felt like a basement (it IS in the basement) but I’ve had improvements in mind that would make it feel more inspiring. When I first started my art studio looked like this:

Over time it’s slowly been transformed into a space that I can really use. The first step was painting the walls:

Then Brett helped me build an wall easel system using 2x4x that can be easily moved and adjusted:

But still something felt off…maybe it was too cluttered…not to mention that the floor was always gritty from the cement. Then I woke up a few days ago and decided that I needed to paint the floor white!

It didn’t take that long to paint. I should have done this a long time ago. Here’s a short time-lapse:

 

A post shared by Ashley Hackshaw (@lilblueboo) on Jul 19, 2017 at 11:15am PDT

Painting the floor suddenly makes the room seem bigger and also brighter and cheerier. Brett placed that big piece of 4’x8′ styrofoam on the floor so I could test out the size before we actually build a worktable:

The past few days I’ve been moving everything back into the space. And now I could spend all day down there! It stays about 60 degrees all year round. I’m feeling inspired. 

Here are a few links to the studios of famous artists…I love seeing artists in their work environment:

Norman Rockwell’s Studio (so neat and orderly!)

Jackson Pollock’s Studio

Willem de Kooning’s Studio

Chuck Close’s Studio

I could list a dozen more but I’m hungry and can’t write anymore!