Sketchbooks

I tend to work my way through a book once I’ve started it; rather than have several on the go. I’m onto my sixth book since starting drawing again last July, and I’ve found it’s a fantastic picture diary of the place we’ve been , good and bad times passing by, good drawings and terrible ones. As I work through a book I’ve sometimes found that the paper doesn’t really suit my style. Well, I just stick with it and look forward to the end when I can move on to a book with paper I enjoy working on more.
I’ve tried some of the moleskines (I prefer the water colour ones, rather than the sketchbooks) but at the moment I’m enjoying using some cheap A5 sketchbooks I found in an art shop on holiday.
I tend to prefer A5, hardback (definitely NOT spiral bound) I like the feel of a hard, bound book in my hands.
Only recently have I started up other sketchbooks running at the same time;
1 – An A4 sized book for life drawings (I work in a junior school and wanted to keep my life drawing work seperate from the regular drawings in my daily sketches)
2 – An A5 book which I am labelling up to start sketching every house on my street (I like the idea of having a sketchbook with a theme, but didn’t want to restrict myself to have to sketch each and every house on a daily basis in order – there are over 400 houses on my street!)

I would say go with what you enjoy doing and what works for you; try out a few different sketchbooks and see whether they ‘fit’ your drawing lifestyle (I’ve a japanese folded moleskine on a shelf which I’m looking forward to using, but I don’t quite know when, and a fabriano book with coloured paper which I sent off for because it looked interesting, but I know I’ll hate using it because the pages won’t open out flat – another pet peeve I’ve discovered I seem to have!)

Have fun exploring!