Happy New Year! We hope you had an excellent holiday season and would like to take this opportunity to wish you the very best for the upcoming Year. Thanks for supporting Engrave and our various projects! We’re excited to add more amazing art to the Engrave Your Book collection in 2010. Domestic shipping will continue to be FREE!



I’d like to welcome Jacob Escobedo to the leather Moleskine cover artist series. Jacob is an artist and commercial designer living in Atlanta, GA. He is the Creative Director for the Cartoon Network’s adult-block of programming, Adult Swim. Only in person can one truly appreciate the intricate details of this piece.

Click here to browse the artist series.

Engrave recently had our warehouse-wide open house night. It was a huge success; with over 1500 visitors through the building. We unveiled some new art pieces by Jacob Escobedo, Alisha Wessler, Michael Hsiung, and Dan Strong. Also on display, were a few pieces from Project Chaboo. Thanks to all who could make it, I look forward to our next open house!

Check out some photos from the evening:

We now offer black leather Moleskine covers. We’ve spent months searching for the perfect black vegetable tanned leather. The artwork above is “snakes” by pattern master, Dan Funderburgh. Here are a few new additions to the artist series: (TL clockwise: Owen Gildersleeve, Amy Ruppel, Junichi Tsuneoka, Tetuko Hanggoro.)

I recently laser cut a few large format art pieces for local Portland artist, Stef Choi. The characters were cut from 1/2″ thick MDF ultralight and then shaped and painted by Stef. They are part of a group show hosted by Gallery Nucleus called “sweet streets”, which is a collection of art inspired by Japanese street fashion.

Her pieces are on display at Gallery Nucleus until September 14th. Check out the video below of the pieces being laser-cut by my large format Trotec speedy 500.

I’d like to welcome local Portland artist Ryan Bubnis to the Engrave Your Book leather Moleskine cover collection. The cover pictured above is laser engraved onto a vegetable tanned leather cover and is now available here. Ryan has an opening reception at Nemo in Portland this Friday.

Featured Artist- Ryan Bubnis from Nemo Design on Vimeo.

In the above video which was produced by Nemo, Ryan discusses his artwork and what you can expect at the upcoming show this friday. I’m excited to collaborate with Ryan on future projects!

Photos by Anna Campbell.

Recently, my friend Ken Tomita curated a furniture design show like no other called Project Chaboo. He brought together 50 of Portland’s finest industrial designers, architects, illustrators, inventors, engineers, and carpenters to reinterpret one of his signature designs. The design is based on a common Japanese low table, known as chabudai. I was fortunate enough to collaborate with one of the nicest illustrators in Portland, Amy Ruppel on her chaboo. I engraved her leaf design into the top surface, then laser cut felt to be infilled into the birch.

Here’s what Amy had to say about her chaboo:
“Since this chaboo is made of a green, solid material, I wanted an emblem of strength to come out of it. To me, that is a young stag in the woods. The felt helps to soften the piece and give it a sense of quiet and a tactile quality that longs to be touched. I like for my work to reflect nature and what inspires me about it. Catching a glimpse of birds or an animal in the woods is exciting to me, and I want to share that excitement.

Large Moleskine® covers are now available! During March, domestic shipping will be free.

Featured Artist:
Junichi Tsuneoka was born and raised in Japan and upon graduating Waseda University in Tokyo, he moved to the USA. Junichi established a style often recognized as “California Roll Stylie,” the result of both visual and conceptual fusion of Japanese pop culture and U.S. urban culture. He’s currently busy creating unique character designs for his Seattle-based STUDIO STUBBORN SIDEBURN.

Click here to browse the artist series.

The pressure’s off! Just give an Engrave Your Book Gift Card and the recipient can choose a cover from the artist series or upload a custom image. Gift cards ship within 24hrs and ship worldwide at no extra cost.

If you’re in Barcelona from now until March 3rd make sure to check out Rojo Gallery. There you’ll find on display the work of Engrave Your Book artist, Justine Ashbee. Justine is known for her large scale free-form sharpie drawings. “I begin with a curve, from which lines and forms begin to emerge, evolve, morph, and grow organically, in an intuitive flow, while maintaining delicate, elegant precision.” Here are a few close-up shots of a 3×7m mural she created for the exhibit with paint pens and china markers:

If the Iberian peninsula isn’t in the cards this spring, you can still enjoy Justine’s ‘amorphous entities’ at www.justineashbee.com or on your personal leather moleskin cover. Congratulations on your first solo European show Justine!