Celtic Knotwork

In celebration of St. Patrick's Day and in anticipation of the Oscar nominated animated film The Secret of Kells which I can't wait to see, this month's project is Celtic knotwork.

I made a hot dog booklet from the back panel of a brown grocery bag and followed directions on the web for making Celtic knot designs. There are directions using graph paper but I preferred the simpler way of drawing the design in crayon, marker, or colored pencil and then adding the outlines to make the interlocking knots.

Written directions

in Spanish

Video

My Book of Celtic Knotwork on flickr

LINKS
Book of Kells at the Trinity Library in Dublin

Book of Kells DVD
This short video promoting the DVD gives some close-up views of pages from the Book of Kells. You can purchase a copy at John Neal Booksellers.

The Secret of Kells website
You can watch the film's trailer here.

Celtic Knots
This was my favorite site for Celtic knots. It was here I found the draw first, outline later method which is called felt-tip pen on the website. There are also outlines which you can print and color or trace over and then add outlines as well as lots more information.

Celtic Knotwork
I liked this site a lot too. There is a method of drawing your own simple grid and then building the knotwork design.

Art by Deirdre McCullough Greenwald
My friend Deirdre has been using Celtic knotwork in amazing ways in her work for many years. You can see samples of her work here.

Snowdrops

Spring is on the way. First snowdrops are in the garden. For years I have only had one lonely snowdrop which never seemed to want to clump and spread as they are supposed to do. I planted more bulbs last fall and was happy to see a new patch coming up near the steps. The image is a page from the Book of Hours I made for one of the projects in Handmade Books For A Healthy Planet. There will be an online supplement to the book which will have videos, links, and patterns like letter outlines to illuminate for the Book of Hours.