Letter Art:
35 stylish letters to make and give
By Clare Youngs
CICO Books, April 2014
£14.99 Hardback
ISBN 978-1-78249-084-5
Star rating: ****
Clare Youngs, CICO Books star craft author, has come up with
a fontastic :) idea for a new title: letterforms in all shapes, sizes, and media.
Drawing on her background in graphic design, Clare has produced a book full of
typographically-inspired designs.
In olden days, familiarity with typefaces used to be the
domain of professional graphic designers and typesetters. Now that everyone has
access to computer word-processing, everybody’s got a favourite font. And of
course, alphas are especially important to card-makers and scrapbookers.
Most of the projects in this book are large-scale home dec
ideas – the sort of thing you’d pay a mint for from a trendy mail order
company. The projects look just great, are do-able – and inexpensive, to make,
too. Lots of scope for using re-cyled materials. Super graphics, in all
senses.
Letter Art is not
exclusively a papercraft title, but papercrafting does feature prominently in
it, even in the sections not devoted to papercrafts (as you would expect). The book is divided into
the following sections: Papercraft
Letters, Painted and Printed Letters
(lots of paper-based stuff here), Mixed
Media Letters, and Fabric Letters.
The attractively-photographed projects are accompanied by
easy-to-follow step-by-steps, illustrated by (wait for it) --- Clare and Ian
Youngs (understanding of the brief guaranteed!). There’s a section of
reduced-sized templates back-of-book – but you are encouraged to use the
letterforms of your own choice.
Of course, letters and paper go together – and as a
papercrafter, I do think that the papercraft projects are the most successful.
Some of the projects include: Vintage
Graphic Letters – choose a letter, enlarge it and 3-D-ify it in cardboard
covered with patterned paper. Foamboard
Lollipop Letters: whimsical
letters-on-a-stick. (Could make a fun birthday party centrepiece.) Sculptural Scrollwork: jumbo quilled letter. The Mexican Paper Letters work a treat: trad Mexican papercut tissue
paper, but in letterforms. The Corrugated
Capital is a very clever idea. The ridges of the corrugated card are
selectively flattened to create areas of light and shadow. The Slot-Together Letters in mixed prints work a treat. Reflecting the popular Circus-trend
in typefaces, there’s a Fairground Flair 3-D letterform.
If you are up for trying projects outside your papercrafter’s
comfort zone, there’s lots to choose from. There’s the Wire Cage Letter (wire-cutters required), and the Fruit Crate Letter (some woodworking
lite called for).
So – Letter Art
amounts to big fun with jumbo letterforms. This title would make an ideal gift
for a crafter. It comes out in April –
so you can pre-order it now. And I will
eagerly anticipate whatever Clare Youngs turns her very creative hands to
next.
Note: I was supplied
with a review copy of this title.
