Erinzam News

After moving, unpacking, arranging, etc. the studio is finally ready to be unveiled! I share a studio space with my husband, Ben Schlitter, although most of the time I am the one who has my stuff all over the place. Between the two of us we use this space to design, paint, draw, illustrate, photograph, screen print, bind books, sew, make various things out of paper, pack up our Etsy orders, you name it. This is the perfect place for a couple of art nerds to hang out.

One of my favorite things in the room is the red table (click on the top image to see a larger view), which was originally found by Ben, brown and ugly. A fresh coat of red paint spiced it up. This is the spot that I’m constantly trying to keep clean, but as you can see, no matter how hard I try, it always ends up covered with stuff! I am also quite fond of the small poster section in the corner, which includes beauties from Hatch Show Print and Gardner Design. Let’s not forget the “shelf of goodies” above the computer. A selection of goodies near a Mac is a necessity for every graphic designer. Some of these include: packaging for a real Russian robot and mini parking garage, little wire bicycles from Thailand, a few wind up toys and bobblehead creatures, and the obligatory rubber chicken.

Here I am again, pulling things from the recycle bin! I couldn’t resist these materials, though. The brown book, which I named Ecopak, is created from a paper tray used to hold produce from the grocery store. My favorite part is how the pages are cut different sizes to fit inside. The blue book is made from an interesting piece of packaging foam, enhanced with an illustration of an oil rig. Fitting, since that’s where this foam’s life began.

Ecopak sold already, but the oil rig book and another book similar to it are still available through Etsy.

Ben Schlitter is posting new drawings daily, all of which are whimsical and straight out of his imagination. Although I love them all, his most recent post caught my eye. The names are cool too. This one is called Egnaro.

Finally! After months, and even years of creating a stash of fun and unique fabric scraps, I am putting them to use. In the works is a small series of books made from this very pile of textiles. Here are the first two, made from vintage drapery samples discovered this past summer in a 2nd hand store. More to come!

A sampling of unique kitchen and tea towels, printed, embroidered, or woven by hand:

Left to right, top: PataPri, artgoodies, hannahlaura, rockpaperscissorsart
Left to right, bottom: ofpaperandthread, OHHONEY, MrPS, jschubertdesigns

After years of using paper towels, I’m giving them up. Well, not completely, but as much as possible. My most recent trip to Europe made my dependence on a constant stream of disposable paper very noticeable. Blame it on being American, but I had no idea that I was needlessly filling up my trash can with fluffy white paper used to dry my hands and wipe my face. About the same time as the trip, I received a very special collection of hand-embroidered tea towels as a wedding gift. I love these towels! I am now creating a collection of fun and pretty towels that hang all over the kitchen. This way, I have no excuse to reach for the paper when my hands are dripping wet. This new change of pace led me to the next step: cloth napkins. I’m not sure what took me so long to prefer cloth over paper, but now I will never go back. Cloth napkins are much more fun. I don’t even need to mention the money and the trees that I save.

I came up with an easy way to create a fun stash of cloth napkins on the cheap, created from kitchen towels. Most available cloth napkins are white, and I frequently eat curry, spaghetti sauce, blueberries, you name it. This makes the white napkins look gross after one or two uses. I select kitchen towels with dark colors or busy patterns which can hide my messes. The set of towels I selected above are from Anthropologie. The process is so simple. I fold each towel in half lengthwise and cut along the fold. I then double fold, pin and stitch a new hem along each cut edge. Done! That’s it. These napkins are not a standard “napkin size” but they work quite well for everyday meals. You can bring out the fancy white ones when you have guests.

My husband and I left the beautiful Kansas sky for the beautiful California weather. After the long hiatus caused by moving, I am so happy to be back in a studio space.

One of the first projects I began was to convert a stash of matchbooks (that I found while moving) into mini books. I decided to convert them all. I had plenty of interesting paper scraps saved up from past projects and they made perfect little pages in these matchbook books. I like to think of these as books in disguise. That way, if you ever need to take secret notes while on a detective mission, for example, this is the perfect place to do it. I already began to post some of them individually and also as sets on Etsy.

Back in July I was fortunate to participate in the Paper Quilt Project. This project, involving a variety of fantastic artists, was organized by Dawbis, an artist and environmentalist. This is how the project works: each month 12 artists contribute a collage panel toward that month’s quilt. Over the course of this year, there will be 12 quilts built, one representing each month. Once all of the panels are created and collected, they will be auctioned off or donated to a charitable cause.

Dawbis sent me a little packet of paper scraps and directions, so that my collage would be the right size, etc. What fun! I took an evening to collage the scraps together… it isn’t my best work, but it was enjoyable to make. I sent it back to Dawbis, and she posted it with the others on the Paper Quilt Project site. I love the way the different panels look together in the online gallery.

I have a collection of antique matchbooks that have resided in storage, waiting for a new purpose. At my mom’s suggestion to turn them into mini books, I pulled them out and began the transformation (thanks Mom!). What a great way to lose the flammability and keep the nostalgia! If you’d like to try this yourself, here’s a quick how-to.

1. Choose a paper or papers to use as pages.

2. Using an awl or similar tool, gently pry open the back prongs of the staple holding the matchbook together.

3. Remove the matches, leaving the staple in the front portion of the matchbook (be careful not to tear through the cover with the staple).

4. Cut your paper to the size of the matches and make a stack of pages about the same thickness as the chipboard portion of the matches. Using the matches as a guide, punch two holes in the base of your stack of pages.

5. Place the stack of pages within the cover by guiding the staple through the holes at the base of the pages.

6. Thread the staple back through the back cover of the matchbook and use a bone folder or similar tool to press the prongs back into place.

Voilá! You now have a new little book to write secret notes in or other things of similar importance.

I recently hit the found object jackpot. After discovering the potential that cassette tapes hold as book covers, a whole world of possibility opened up. I started out using a cassette as the front cover of a book and its matching lyric insert for the back cover. A few of these are pictured here: Indigo Girls, Lionel Richie and Bruce Springsteen (I can’t help but laugh at Bruce’s butt on the back cover). Recently, I paired some unusual cassettes with old book covers. I love the uniqueness of these. Now that garage sale season has started… I may be unstoppable!

Instant lettering had its heydey before I began design school. In a way, I think that I missed out. Although kerning type with a computer is about 1000 times easier than with rub-off lettering, there is something extremely satisfying about using the stuff. Thankfully, there are piles of it just waiting to be found and used. I have used rub-off lettering in my paintings for several years, but just recently became interested in introducing it into bookbinding projects. I particularly like how it lends itself to treating typography as images, rather than just symbols or characters to be read and understood.