Page layout discussion with Roz Stendahl – Visual Journal

For anyone who has not come across Roz Stendahl you have been missing a treat, she has been keeping sketchbook journals since she was a child and has been making her own hand-bound journals for over 25 years.  Her journals are a visual delight – a combination of her love for nature and the everyday.  Roz is very active in the Everyday Matters group and regularly dispenses useful information on sketching, journaling and materials.  On her blog Roz Wound Up, she has recently published an informative series on page layout (see links at the bottom of this post), culminating in this video – a brief glimpse through one of her journals.

This video shows lots of good ideas of how to incorporate sketches and other items you want to insert in your journal without putting undue pressure on the spine and binding of your book.  As a prolific journaler, Roz regularly fills 14 books a year, she has developed an indexing system (which you can see on the last page of her journal in the video) – read about her system here.

Informative posts by Roz you may like to check out (all links open in a new window)  -

… and a Little Bit about Page Layout
Looking More at Page Make Up—Part II: Evolution of a Page Spread
Looking More at Page Make Up—Part III: Evolution of Another Page Spread
Looking More at Page Make Up—Part IV: Playing with Photocopies
Looking More at Page Make Up—Part V: More Fun with Photocopies
Comfort Zones, Habits, and Page Layout

I will leave you with some wise words from Roz from her recent post Why Journal?

“…. You might have just created 30 pages of the ugliest sketches and paintings and idiotic writing on the planet—it still doesn’t make your internal critic right. It’s a step, one that you took, despite the chattering of that internal critic. Future steps will be easier because you took one. (And this will continue to be true every day you take such a step.)

You hold in your hands a document which says “I allowed myself to create; I allowed myself to take risks.” I think creative risks are like loose rocks on a hillside. We scramble over them, slipping at times, at other times finding sure footing, so that we can get to the top of the hill and have a better view.

I think having a better view (of ourselves, our creative process, our place in the world, the larger world, the people in our world) is what regular journaling is all about.

Why do you journal? What goals does it meet? What benefits do you derive from it? It’s good to ask these questions. The answers will be unique to you and tell you something about yourself.

Remember: just because it has great benefits doesn’t mean it can’t also be fun!”