I have a sketch book that I’ve been keeping for a few years ongoing now that I do collage work in. It started after a design class I took while at school; the assignment was to bring in found items, markers, white out, tape, etc. and a stack of 11″ x 17″ blank paper. Then in 10 minute increments, you had to create something on the page with no thought, no judgment, no rules, just simply “spontaneously create”.

Being someone that loves rules and guidelines and taking as much time as needed to “get it just right”, this was both a scary & liberating exercise for me. I have held on to the tradition, and now years later, I have quite the book going. I use all kinds of found objects, from lace, to string, to bottle caps, nails, masking tape, whatever I find & like at the time. The pages are constantly morphing, rarely deemed “finished”. (That’s a rule if I were to say that, right?)

At times, elements from within the book end up in designs, which is never the intent behind the book, but if you find inspiration or a solution within it, it should become a tool within one’s toolbox, yes?

I worked in it over the weekend, so if you want to see a few pages from the book, (the cover is what is in the image above) then come on in and take a peek…

This entry was posted on Monday, May 5th, 2008 at 3:12 pm and is filed under culture, design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.