Creating Body Coverings

Spotted at a Rasputin Records & Books in Campbell, CA.

Creating Body Coverings was published in 1974 by Van Nostrand Reinhold. The cover typeface is VGC’s Eightball. The interior (not pictured) appears to be set in Optima. From the back cover:

Are you what you wear?

Does what you wear express you? People everywhere are tired of wearing what fashion dictates and they are individualizing their clothes. Detailed in this book are dozens of ways to recycle old clothes and make impersonal ready-mades into unique body coverings. Got an old tablecloth? Make a new dress. Transform a worn blanket into a cape, a flour sack into a shirt. Paint your sneakers; appliqué your pants; stuff your necktie; feather your vest. Embroider, batik, tie-dye, weave, macramé, crochet; cut, glue, patch, tattoo—covering your body is not like covering your walls—you’re not committed for very long, and you can change as the mood takes you.

Jean Ray Laury, designer and writer, is the author of several books on crafts and the fabric arts—Appliqué Stitchery, Quilts and Coverlets, Doll Making, and Wood Appliqué.

Joyce Aiken, professor of art at California State University at Fresno, teaches a wide range of courses in the textile arts. She is co-author of Handmade Rugs.

Together, Jean and Joyce run Everywoman’s Studio in Clovis, Calif., where they offer a continuously changing series of mini-courses in textiles, fibers, wood, and (most recently) body coverings!