Book binding | Make Book Pages from a Brown paper bag

Sharing one of my book binding secrets with you guys today!

I know my plan was to mostly use watercolor papers in my next art journal, but I found all these pretty paper bags in my stash… So I thought I’d cut them down and use them in my next book binding project.

Papers are always accumulating around here, so when I find ways to cut down from the recycle pile I’m a happy gal!

And I am especially in love with the flower shop bag I got recently, with pink flowers. I think they are Twinflowers (Linnaea borealis), printed on the brown paper bag.

I also have some brown envelopes, the sturdy kind that makes great pages. I just cut those apart and fold them once.

With the paper bags I make sure that any motives is on the page is centered on at least one of the pages in the fold. Then I add these to my signatures.

I really like this mix of white watercolor papers and brown paper bags. Yummy!

Brown paper is great for art journals because it’s often thick enough to use acrylics on. If there are parts of the envelope or bag I don’t like, I will just cover it up with a postcard or collage ephemera. Can’t wait to start working on these pages…

Do you recycle materials and fun or pretty papers for your artsy books?

I will show you the finished journal next week.