I just arrived back in nyc. My final week in Rosendale entailed seeing more foreign furry creatures – including a few beavers, a groundhog, deer – and although I missed the black bear he was across the road a few times this week waiting for the blueberries to get ripe. This was nicely juxtaposed today when walking through Fort Greene Park in Brooklyn seeing a rather ridiculous photo shoot for sneakers on the tennis court.

So… the books are finished! – I must say although it was sad to leave there is something quite satisfying about having a stack of hand printed and bound books to carefully pack into your suitcase (though not quite as fun to transport). Although I had this feeling of accomplishment it was still sad to leave that forested lady utopia that is Women’s Studio Workshop. It’s kind of hard to describe the place but if you have been there you just understand the place, its quirks and its the understated rituals – like a smorgasbord pot luck at 12.30 and lake swimming everyday at 5 – and the warping of time that happens there. One week feels like a month, so I guess I was there 8 months in WSW time…?

After those weeks made up of long days of printing the binding somehow seemed super fast – especially as Anna taught me some tricks for editioning books that she had picked up whilst working at Arion Fine Press in SF. I also had a bunch of volunteers -even just popping in to the stack books in the press etc and of course Chris my surgeon & casing buddy- amongst many other things. Anyway it is funny that all the things I was anxious about along the way were things I didn’t need to be and in the end I have a really handsome looking handmade book…