There’s nothing better than settling down somewhere comfortable and getting lost in a good book for an hour. It’s so quick and easy to make a calligraphy inspired bookmark either as a gift for the bookworm in your life, or for yourself, to mark your place.
I like to use 300gsm watercolour paper (Winsor and Newton cold pressed is my particular favourite to use) as it is thick enough to be durable, and slightly dimpled, feeling more luxurious to the touch. It also means I can confidently use any of my calligraphy inks with no worries that they will bleed.
You can make your bookmark to be any size; I find that the width of A4 is the perfect length for my bookmark and so I can make 6 bookmarks from one sheet. If you have an A5 piece of cardstock, you can make 3 bookmarks when the long edge of the page is placed vertically. I also like to round off the edges with my edging punch; as well as looking good, this is also really helpful to avoid the bookmark becoming dog eared, as some straight cornered bookmarks can do.
You can write any word or phrase on your bookmark; possible ideas you might want to consider are:
- You pawsed here
- So many books, so little time
- I wasn’t sad, I just needed a new book
- Bookworm
- Find your story in every page
- Sip tea, read books
- Fiction is the best therapy
- Never judge a book by its movie
- Escape
- Character Collector
Depending on the word count you use, you may choose to add embellishments like dots, stars, botanicals or even a stack of books! To finish, you can leave your bookmark as it is, or you can embellish with a silk tassel or even a thin piece of ribbon. You’ll see I went for the ribbon, which is a dangerous move as I have a cat who likes to steal the ribbon from bookmarks and will stop at nothing to get it…even if that means you lose your place!!
If you prefer to watch along, you can see the full tutorial on my YouTube channel: