Q: I understand you have been a bookseller, a teacher, and a librarian—all related fields. When did you make the leap to being a book artist?

I started making books when I was six or seven. I’d cut out images from magazines or from Sears’ catalogs and paste them onto construction paper and make little books. So, I think book arts was just gonna happen for me. As an adult, I came back to it after taking a community college class when I was living in Eugene back in the 1980s. This is where I learned how to marble paper and bind a book. It was so wonderful and I said: “oh, my gosh, I need to be doing this.” For a long time, I was working in isolation, as there wasn’t a book arts community in Eugene back then.

It wasn’t until I moved to Olympia that I started to create book art in a more focused way. After working for Barnes and Noble, I began working for the Timberland Regional Library. When I first connected with Elspeth Pope and a small group of people who were doing letterpress and book art projects at Elspeth’s home, that’s what brought me into the sphere of what was happening locally. Elspeth would invite artists to stay with her and teach. I was learning a lot. Out of that experience, a small group formed with MalPina Chan, Lucia Harrison, Gudren Aurand, and Randi Parkhurst. We’d meet periodically at Lucia’s to show our work and process. That was really helpful because we were getting and giving feedback, positive encouragement, and mutual support.

Q: This sounds a lot like what’s been going on with PSBA. What was the connection?

I think Lucia and MalPina bridged the geographic space, making the art connection between Olympia and Tacoma. And shortly after this, Jane Carlin and Rochelle Monner put out the call to see who was interested in forming a more formal organization dedicated to book arts. Randi and I traveled to that first meeting of a large group of people at Collins Library, who were interested in making book art in community. Go Jane! She is a mover and a shaker. It was so…so satisfying to see that creative spark explode for so many people who wanted to participate and be part of the group. The synergy was fantastic.

The thing that I vocalized at the meeting was how to pull in people from this end of the Sound, who are more isolated. I said hopefully we would eventually be able to offer workshops and meetings down here, and I was willing to make that happen. Later, Elizabeth Walsh and I hosted get-togethers and workshops at her house, so it was happening. That was how it all unfolded for me.

Q: Now that you’ve been part of PSBA since its beginning, what are your thoughts about it?

I’ve been involved in many groups over the years. And we probably all know groups can be difficult, and they are not always successful. There’s got to be a “hive-mind” that works. This group has been the most amazing organization with which I have had the privilege of being associated. It has been fantastic. I think that is in large part due to the fact that the book artists who came to be part of PSBA have a lot of experience in their personal and professional lives—they know how to “do it,” and they have generously brought that expertise to the organization. I hope this will continue to be true and that the next generation will recognize and encourage that quality in how they associate with one another. That’s the secret sauce.

I think the love of the craft and the true friendship that we have with one another feeds and nurtures us. And this is hard to find; we need to hang on to it.

Q: What kind of books were you working on then?

I started out with traditional codex-style books because I wanted to master that form; I wanted to learn the basics of book binding. I felt my strength was my Virgo liking things to be well done and my need to feel I was competent at it. That was a real focus for me to begin with. I didn’t get into making more imaginative pieces until I allowed myself to think I actually was more creative than I gave myself credit. Finally, I was able to unshackle my inhibitions, and that led to creations that came out of my mind. I didn’t really understand that they would be impactful to other people. I was developing a style of my work that is recognizably me.

Q: What book would you like to share with us as part of this interview?

This was my first commission. Mary Laird, a wonderful book arts teacher, recommended me to a client of hers, who wanted a specialty binding done of a folio manuscript. I wasn’t that long into the craft to expect something like this. Big decision, should I go for it? It took two years, and the client was okay with that.

The title is Of A Feather. It is a unique quarter binding of black goat skin leather over rosewood boards, featuring a wood-burnt engraving of a feather. The text and engravings are by Colin See-Paynton, with an introduction by Sir David Attenborough. It is housed in a bespoke archival box. You can find more about this book on his website. With all my work, I try to create an immersive experience, engaging multiple senses.

Q: Here comes the dinner party question. If you could invite five or so people to dinner—people from across time and space—who would they be?

I thought this might be hard, but the names came quickly: Sappho, Georgia O’Keeffe, Maria Popova (who writes and edits Marginalian—highly recommend reading her blog), Gertrude Stein, May Sarton* (poet), Emily Dickinson, and lastly Melissa Hardie-Budden, MBE (she founded the Hypatia Trust in Cornwall). I did know Melissa, but not as long or as deeply as I would have liked. She was one of those seminal people who helped me. I also did a commission for her, and I presented and donated a personal Cornish ancestry homage piece of my work to the Trust.

But, you’re really making this a small party. I’d like to think of a Judy Chicago table with lots of artists.

Q: Do you collect anything other than books?

Oh, yes, I do, I do! Netsuke for one (showing one example). I collect see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil monkeys. I have a lot of bears (my totem animal), and they all have names. I collect Chinese and Japanese chops. I have statues of Guanyin, the Bodhisattva of compassion, in every room. I collect rocks and stones—you’ve got to have pocket rocks. I have a lot of art and craft works, many original—some mine, but mostly other people’s. I need all this in my environment.

When I have coffee with a group of friends—“Da Goils"—at my house, they have said: “I like coming to your house, it’s like going to a museum.” There are lots of things to look at here; I’m like a magpie. Every single one of these things has memories for me. And because I’ve had an interest in world history, philosophy, and literature all my life, these things are around me because they remind me how rich and wonderful life is.

Q: Can you name your favorite book? This is a hard one.

[long pause] Yes, this is really hard. The book I’ve read and reread the most is The Lord of the Rings by Tolkien, but having said that…there are so many. I can’t say I have one favorite. What I’m trying to do in my life now is to pare down my library to the books that have meant the most to me in my life. My task is to get it down to two bookcases—I’m not there yet, but I’ve gotten it down to four!

My whole eye issue really settled it for me. For a long time, I felt if I didn’t have my library around me, people wouldn’t know who I was. If they could see my library, they would see who I was, by what I had read. I had to keep them all, just in case. Now, since it’s hard for me to read, I’ve been sending books to the local libraries. And I have my little free library in front of my house, built as a memorial to librarians I’ve known and loved.

Q: What words best describe you?

Curious Old Soul.

*Famous line from May Sarton’s poetry: “We have to dare to be ourselves, however frightening or strange that self may prove to be.”