{"id":11060,"date":"2017-04-30T01:00:08","date_gmt":"2017-04-30T05:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/?p=11060"},"modified":"2025-09-15T15:46:15","modified_gmt":"2025-09-15T19:46:15","slug":"catching-up-with-hannah-brown-no-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/2017\/04\/30\/catching-up-with-hannah-brown-no-5\/","title":{"rendered":"Catching Up With Hannah Brown \/\/ No. 5"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>For the final installment, I asked Hannah Brown<\/a> about her binding of Love is Enough<\/em><\/a> by William Morris.\u00a0Just like The Tempest<\/em>, shown in the previous post, Hannah used fair calf and an array of colored leather onlays. The design includes four\u00a0beautifully embroidered birds and five beetles. At the points of intersection on the trellis, Hannah has attached twenty-eight gold plated brass pieces. Smaller details in the design have been blind and gold tooled.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The cover design is complimented with a\u00a0patterned endpaper. The book lives in a teak box with a frosted prespex lid, which allows you to view the book.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I had the chance to see this binding in person, while visiting last year’s\u00a0<\/strong>Antiquarian Book Fair in NYC. First I want to say that it is absolutely\u00a0<\/strong>gorgeous and I may have stared at it for an awkward length of time. The\u00a0<\/strong>embroidery on the birds, is some of the most detailed embroidery I’ve seen\u00a0<\/strong>on your work. As your work evolves the embroidery is becoming more\u00a0<\/strong>painterly and reads more traditional in style. For the final question\u00a0<\/strong>of the month, I’d love for you to talk about how your think you’re previous\u00a0<\/strong>work has informed the way you build a design today, particularly how you\u2019ve\u00a0<\/strong>grown from simple machine embroidery to complex and layered hand embroidery.
\n<\/strong>Thank you for your comments! It was an absolutely wonderful text block to be commissioned to bind. I am starting to see my embroidery work more like \u201cpainting\u201d with thread. Through various social media channels I am now aware of more embroidery artists who are inspiring me to develop my embroidery skills further. I love the way that colour can by built up so subtly with the threads whilst adding a pleasing texture to the surface of the leather on a binding.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

One thing that I am very careful with though is durability, books are made to be used so I have to be very mindful of this when placing my stitches. The difference between utilising embroidery techniques on bindings in comparison to general embroidery on things like wall art is that is has to be designed to be handled. I make sure I tether down my stitches as well as possible to avoid the design catching or being abraded prematurely over time and take extra care when placing stitches over the board joints.<\/p>\n

During my time working at the V&A Museum I had the pleasure of looking at a variety of embroidered bindings from the National Art Library’s collection (the library housed within the museum). It was wonderful to see how the stitching had held out over time, on some better than others due to the amount of handling!<\/p>\n

Machine embroidery has its purposes and is good for producing lines quickly but to me now looks too rigid due to the way it punches the holes in the leather and the regularity of the stitches created. I love the layers than can be built up using hand embroidery as it has far more depth and accuracy to it and following years of practice my fingers are now toughened to it. I have a feeling that binding by binding my work will continue to evolve in this way, especially as my collection of threads grows and grows in size! I have started to teach some classes in embroidery techniques for fine bindings and hope to grow on this and therefore spread my knowledge further in this field.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the final installment, I asked Hannah Brown about her binding of Love is Enough by William Morris.\u00a0Just like The Tempest, shown in the previous post, Hannah used fair calf and an array of colored leather onlays. The design includes four\u00a0beautifully embroidered birds and five beetles. At the points of intersection on the trellis, Hannah […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[68,240],"tags":[1196,67,574,2159,2160],"class_list":["post-11060","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bookbinding","category-interview","tag-embroidered-binding","tag-fine-binding","tag-hannah-brown","tag-love-is-enough","tag-william-morris"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2Btis-2So","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11055,"url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/2017\/04\/23\/catching-up-with-hannah-brown-no-4\/","url_meta":{"origin":11060,"position":0},"title":"Catching Up With Hannah Brown \/\/ No. 4","author":"Erin Fletcher","date":"April 23, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Last year, Hannah Brown created this impeccable binding of Shakespeare's The Tempest. Bound in full leather, Hannah first dyed the fair calf in a mottled effect, which provides the perfect stormy backdrop. The rest of the design is comprised of a variety of colored onlays, silk embroidery and blind, carbon\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "bookbinding"","block_context":{"text":"bookbinding","link":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/category\/bookbinding\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/TheTempest3-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/TheTempest3-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/TheTempest3-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":11000,"url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/2017\/04\/09\/catching-up-with-hannah-brown-no-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":11060,"position":1},"title":"Catching Up With Hannah Brown \/\/ No. 2","author":"Erin Fletcher","date":"April 9, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Randall Davies and His Books of Nonsense\u00a0is bound in yellow goatskin with a hexagonal honeycomb pattern. Hannah Brown used a variety of techniques to adorn the honeycomb, which include embroidery, gold, carbon and blind tooling, leather onlays and inlays, impressions and cut-outs through the boards. There are sixteen embroidered bees\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "interview"","block_context":{"text":"interview","link":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/category\/interview\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/RandallDavies2-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/RandallDavies2-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/RandallDavies2-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":11049,"url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/2017\/04\/16\/catching-up-with-hannah-brown-no-3\/","url_meta":{"origin":11060,"position":2},"title":"Catching Up With Hannah Brown \/\/ No. 3","author":"Erin Fletcher","date":"April 16, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Hannah Brown covered this binding of David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas in dark blue goatskin. An embroidered outline of a world map expands across the entire binding.\u00a0To create contrast between land formations and water, Hannah blinded in a short line tool in a dense sporadic pattern. The longitude and latitude lines\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "bookbinding"","block_context":{"text":"bookbinding","link":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/category\/bookbinding\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/CloudAtlas3-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/CloudAtlas3-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/CloudAtlas3-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4034,"url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/2013\/02\/24\/bookbinder-of-the-month-hannah-brown-4-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":11060,"position":3},"title":"Bookbinder of the Month: Hannah Brown","author":"Erin Fletcher","date":"February 24, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"The Locks of the Oxford Canal: A Journey from Oxford to Coventry was published by The Whittington Press in 1984 and includes fifty wood engravings by John Craig. In 2011, Hannah Brown bound a copy for the Designer Bookbinders Annual Competition, receiving the Mansfield Medal for Best Book. The binding\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "binder of the month"","block_context":{"text":"binder of the month","link":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/category\/binder-of-the-month\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/locksoftheoxfordcanal_hannahbrown4.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/locksoftheoxfordcanal_hannahbrown4.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/locksoftheoxfordcanal_hannahbrown4.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/locksoftheoxfordcanal_hannahbrown4.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":7285,"url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/2013\/12\/27\/best-of-2013\/","url_meta":{"origin":11060,"position":4},"title":"Best of 2013","author":"Erin Fletcher","date":"December 27, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"The year of 2013 has been surprisingly busy, both in my business and my personal life. Over the course of the year I established my\u00a0own business, bound my first\u00a0leather embroidered binding, became an Aunt for the second time, started an impressive board game collection, interviewed with Susan Mills for\u00a0Bookbinding Now\u00a0and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "best of"","block_context":{"text":"best of","link":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/category\/best-of\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/bestof2013-a.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/bestof2013-a.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/bestof2013-a.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":10991,"url":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/2017\/04\/02\/catching-up-with-hannah-brown-no-1\/","url_meta":{"origin":11060,"position":5},"title":"Catching Up With Hannah Brown \/\/ No. 1","author":"Erin Fletcher","date":"April 2, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The first interview on the blog was conducted back in February 2013 with the very talented Hannah Brown. Over the past four years, her work has really matured in both design and technique. So over the course of April,\u00a0I'll be catching up with Hannah by featuring work made over the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "interview"","block_context":{"text":"interview","link":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/category\/interview\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/BreakfastAtTiffanys2-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/BreakfastAtTiffanys2-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/BreakfastAtTiffanys2-HannahBrown.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11060","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11060"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11060\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11067,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11060\/revisions\/11067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11060"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11060"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.herringbonebindery.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11060"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}