Many people discovered hand crafts during the Covid lockdowns of 2020. Other embroiderers, like me, taught online as well as taking up new skills. Initially I enrolled in an online course on bookbinding: an introduction to making contemporary books with photographs. In opening a door to a new world of fine binding and designer bookbinders, I discovered the local bookbinding guild offered workshops for basic binding. Over the last few years, I found a new home amongst a group of stimulating makers.

My intention in joining the bookbinders’ guild was not to embroider covers, but to understand the making of books. However, one of the early classes I took, was making bookcloth, the basic fabric on cloth covered books. Preparing an assortment of flatweave fabrics to use, gave me confidence to begin embroidering cloth specifically for covers.

I continue taking book making and book binding classes to learn various techniques. having a new medium to express ideas has been refreshing.

Learning to finely stitch text has also been a new venture which holds much potential. While I have stitched text for many years, I had never bothered to see how to really improve the readability of my stitching. It does not take as long as I had imagined.

The last twelve months or so has been incredibly rewarding. My binding of In Principio The Word of Arvo Pärt’s Music was exhibited at the National Museum in Tallinn, Estonia, September 2025.

I have been playing around with images of the Swift Parrot for three years or so. First it was as an embroidered work. I then made it into a very long concertina book using the Letter to Anthony Albanese from Bob Brown. This made it to the Make Awards, organised by the Australian design Centre in Sydney.

The next iteration was as a map-fold book using rubber stamps that I hand carved, large cut-out of swift parrots and the Bob Brown letter again. The final iteration was as a handbound book, using the rubber stamps again and cutting out silhouettes of the Swift Parrot. This is a pop-up book. Rather than using the whole text of the Bob Brown letter, I used it as inspiration for the text of my book.

I have been making ‘museums’ with miniature books for a few years. The original one was The Red Shoe Museum from 2011. I then made another for my daughter when she left home. These were filled with recipes that our family enjoyed. At the end of 2025 I began making them again. This time with a little more knowledge of bookbinding, however I ended up making it six times to get it right. I made the Museum of Birds filled with books on the black and white birds that visit my garden here in Canberra. The second one, The Museum of Parrots, is filled with the five Australian parrots that are near-extinct.

Last year my book November Skies made it into the Lanyon Art Prize, here in Canberra. This was a fold-out book and I used images of the clouds – and skies over the historic Lanyon Homestead.

The book at the bottom is trial book about Banksias. I have made it in creams and this year will make a colour version.