Albums are perhaps the item I get most requests for, yet I hardly ever make any. I really don't like making post or stab bound albums, and for the longest time high shipping costs for thick books like albums were a problem. Now all shipping is expensive, so I figured why not make some albums for a change. I'm on a long stitch spree and long stitch albums you get!
minimalistic long stitch wedding photo albums by Kaija Rantakari / paperiaarre.com
You wouldn't have noticed by reading this blog, but I secretly have quite a selection of book cloth. As I'm fairly obsessed with using linen fabric, I hardly ever use book cloth for books - it's more of a box making material for me - but long stitch bindings are worth making an exception for. Linen fabric is often so textured the stitches on the spine wouldn't stand out on it as beautifully as they do with smooth book cloth, so there's a purpose and a place for all sorts of materials.
minimalistic long stitch wedding photo albums by Kaija Rantakari / paperiaarre.com
Each album can hold up to 32 or 64 photos depending on whether or not you use both sides of the page, and of course on what size and shape your photos are (you can fit plenty more of Fujifilm Instax Mini photos in there!). The spine is wide enough to accommodate quite a stack of photos without the album bulging in an unsightly manner. The extra width of the spine also makes these books great for creating art journals and artists' books containing bulky collages and other mixed media creations done in dry-ish media.
There are 64 pages of thick off-white drawing paper (acid free, 150gsm). The pages measure 21,5x15cm / 8.5"x5.9" and the outside measurements are 22x15,4x3,2cm / 8.7"x6.1"x1.3".
minimalistic long stitch wedding photo albums by Kaija Rantakari / paperiaarre.com
Inside covers are lined with this beautiful white handmade paper that has a lace grid texture. I used this paper on the white gold spine Coptics as well, and I'm honestly falling in love with it.
minimalistic long stitch wedding photo albums by Kaija Rantakari / paperiaarre.com
You can now find these albums for sale in my shop. I've just sold out of the dotted grid bullet journals, but I hope to have some new ones available next week. I'll probably make the new lot with book cloth covers now that I've gotten the book cloth out of storage and found that some colours pair beautifully with linen I could use for the drawstring pouches.