Bridger Mountain Scribes

The Bridger Mountain Scribes of Montana comprises calligraphers in southwest Montana, including Bozeman and Gallatin Gateway. We meet once a month to discuss calligraphy, artists books, and other book arts, usually on the 2nd Monday of the month at the Bozeman Public Library.

We are a member guild of the statewide Montana guild, Big Sky Scribes. If you’d like to find out more about calligraphy in southwest Montana, attend our meetings, or join the guild, email scribe@bridgermountainscribes.org.

Next meeting February 11

Our February meeting of Bridger Mountain Scribes will be held at the library on Monday, January 14, from 11 AM to 1 PM.
  • The program – We will be making aluminum-can folded pens and then making marks with them. 
  • The 2019 year-long project —
    We are to have chosen our text and cut at least some materials to size in preparation for beginning to assemble the book. Remember that each part of the book can be done (and redone!) separately and the book can be added to at will, so bring at least 5 folios and 5 book wrappers to get you started at the February meeting. A five-inch-square book will require materials in the following sizes:
    • folios: 10″ x 5″, grain short
    • page wrappers: 10″ x 10″ square
    • spine piece: [width of finished book + 1″] x 5″
  • Show and share — Bring anything you’ve been working on. 
 

What to bring:

  • aluminum beverage can (or aluminum flashing if you’d prefer)
  • heavy-duty scissors or tin snips for cutting the aluminum (kitchen shears are quite adequate)
  • ruler
  • bone folder
  • pencil, to be used as the pen staff (so not one of your favorites!) — or a dowel of pencil length
  • print-out of the Erica’s PDF tutorial (attached)
  • ink in a suitable container for dipping
  • paper for experimenting with your new pen

I’ll bring the following to share:

  • duct tape
  • 220-grit sandpaper

If you want to look at folded-pen resources online:

A few years ago, a calligrapher named Joy Deneen instituted Folded Pen Friday on Instagram (#foldedpenfriday) and showed the curated results of this in two blogs posts which I list here for your inspiration. Also, some folded-pen work by three masters. Have fun looking at these:

And finally, be thinking about what we might want to do in March. Does anybody have a technique or tutorial they would like to share?

Next meeting January 14

Our January meeting of Bridger Mountain Scribes will be held at the library on Monday, January 14, from 11 AM to 1 PM.
  • The program – We’ll explore the Pilot Parallel Pen, a well-made fountain calligraphy pen that can be used as-is or filled with any non-waterproof liquid of your choice. I’ll bring a few books which focus on the parallel pen, as well as copies of of Carol DuBosch’s instructions on re-filling the pen. If you have a Pilot Parallel Pen, bring it along. If you want to buy one, I saw that the new store on the north side of town, Paper & Grace (on East Oak), is selling them. I recommend getting a larger size rather than the smallest one. But by no means do you *need* to buy one. I’ll have several extras on hand that you can experiment with. If you want a head-start on what we’ll be doing, check out Carol’s PDF:
    http://www.caroldubosch.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Pilot-Parallel-Pen.pdf
  • The 2019 year-long project — We’ll each be making a 5-inch square modular accordion book. I’ve been in touch with Liz Simmonds, who made the Ben Franklin book, and I’ll share what I’ve learned from her about the structure. This book can be any length (which is one great feature of the structure), but I would recommend at least 8 folios. The book that Liz made had a folio for each of the 13 virtues in Ben Franklin’s list of virtues. So you will want to settle on content for your book. A list would be a good place to start, but that’s just one approach..
  • Show and share — Bring anything you’ve been working on.
  • What to bring:
    • Pilot Parallel Pen if you have it
    • non-waterproof ink if you’re bringing a pen (I’ll have walnut ink on hand)
    • needle-nose pliers if you have them
    • a few 5-inch square pieces of paper to write on
    • a compass if you have one — the kind that draws a circle in pencil
    • a few words to write in a circle; I can’t tell you how many because I don’t know what size pen you’ll be using

Also, mark your calendar for the February 11 meeting at 11 AM.