im doing two book portfolios right now, one with my old studio and one with random friends scattered accross the country, and the iowa state postcard exchange. needless to say . . . i love portfolios, i would love to help start and participate in ANY exchanges going on.

im a printmaker by nature, so im all about editioning, but i would be down for the single book mail offs too.

i think the binding style/themes would have to be changed for the individual project. ive done ones with no size/shape limits, but with common colors and themes, ones with size/shape limits AND common colors and themes, and right now im doing one of each. i think themes are better suited (however) for portfolios where you can have each book next to the others where they compliment eachother in their cohesion. if it was just a single book exchange (where you would send of 1 and recieve 1) it might be more interesting to go by binding style so people could become inspired by other peoples flare and interpretation of the binding.

personally, i get really excited over ideas and themes that push the understanding of the traditional book form, including ones that push books outside of a bound realm, but i am SUCH a sucker for binding (and paper . . . ) that i still more often than not settle into traditional forms with glee.

okay, i guess thats my two cents . . .

My first post here, and my second book project.

The only book I've made was a fairly traditional one, and about 17 years ago (egads!). This one's going to be a bit different: I picked up an old mimeograph machine and I'm printing an artist's manifesto with it (mine). I'll be using an IBM Selectric 1 for cutting the stencil, and I'll have to find some of that wonderous purple duplicator ink for the mimeo.

Still not settled on the paper or the cover material, nor on a binding configuration, but am leaning towards some sort of removable fasteners, such as wing brads. Something industrial, traditional, a bit crude. Hey--sounds like me!

I've already ordered molded rubber stamps for the title and the colophon, but I'd like to use some moveable rubber type (such as were sold to children in the '50s) for some of the larger text. Does anyone know of a source for sans-serif rubber type somewhere between 1/4" and 1/2" tall? Surprisingly, very little like that on eBay.

I'd love to do a book swap of some kind. I'm just in the midst of making a miniature book for the MBS competeion-- its my first foray into miniature book binding, actually. I'm enjoying working with such small dimensions-- only 2.5" square.

I like the idea of a theme-- it would be interesting to see different people's take on the same theme. As for how to do the actual swap-- I'm up for anything.

I'll post some photos of the little guy once its through.

eric