Making Art Journals with Sharon Peoples

Learn to bookbind! Try this fun workshop with Sharon Peoples where you'll learn all about making art journals.

• Dates: 3 – 24 August 2026
  
• Time: Mondays, 9:30am – 12.00pm
  
• Location: NatureArt Lab, M16 Artspace, 21 Blaxland Crescent, Griffith, ACT

About the course:

This course works begins with simple book structures, so that participants will be able to construct a more complex, large-format sketchbook for the final class.

The first class starts with a discussion about artists’ journals and the needs of artists and how students use journals. This will help students decide what type of papers they would like to use in the final projects. We will begin with a simple five-hole pamphlet book with a soft cover and then move on to one with a hard cover.

The next project is a small book using Japanese stab binding with a hard cover.

Our third book has multi-sections and is bound with a soft cover, then we move on to a multi-section book with removable pages.

In the last phase, using the skills of the previous classes, we will then make an A5 journal with a hard cover before moving on to a larger A4 journal with a soft or hard cover (participant’s choice).

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Hand-bind a hard cover book
• Hand-bind a soft cover book
• Sew book sections together
• Make informed choices of suitable papers, card and glues
• Learn about the grain of paper

Pre-requisites: This course is suitable for 16+ beginners with little to no bookbinding experience, or for those wishing to build on the foundations of their bookbinding practice.

Materials:  $50 (payable to the tutor) for materials:

• Awls ($10 each)
• Linen thread, needles, beeswax, baking paper, chux, foam rollers for glues
• Papers, card
• Glues

A list of additional material and equipment (such as paper, scissors, apron) for students to bring will be provided before the first class.

Any questions can be directed to info@natureartlab.com.au

About the tutor:

Dr Sharon Peoples has worked as an artist in Canberra for over 25 years, exhibiting nationally and internationally as well as taking on commissioned work. She has had twelve solo exhibitions since 2010, the most recent were ‘Garden Promenade’ Australian National Botanic Gardens, Canberra, Oct (2024) and ‘From the Highest Tree’, Avid Gallery, Wellington NZ (2023). Sharon spends much time wandering and wondering about gardens. From her own domestic garden to the local bushland and further afield to surrounding national parks, she is energised and draws inspiration by walking in these environments. In recent years a gradual shift to include bookbinding and making has occurred. One highlight of this activity is having her handbound book in the exhibition Scripta manent VII “In principio The Word in Arvo Pärt’s Music”, at the Estonian History Museum, Tallinn, Estonia, Oct 2025. Currently, her bird-related objects are exhibited at the King Island Gallery where she did a residency last year.

NatureArt Lab Awards

2022, Telstra Best of Business Award Winner for Promoting Sustainability, ACT; and National Finalist Award

2024, Telstra Best of Business Award Winner for Building Communities, ACT; and National Finalist Award

2025, Telstra Best of Business Award Finalist for Promoting Sustainability, ACT; and Finalist for Accelerating Women, ACT

2025, Awards Australia Semi-Finalist for Connecting Communities, NSW and ACT; and Semi-Finalist for Small Business Award NSW and ACT. 

Images by Sharon Peoples