If you've ever found yourself needing a spark to get back to the worktable — not a technique tutorial, just a slow, satisfying look at what a finished journal can hold — this flip-through is exactly that. I'm walking through a completed junk journal built around a soft blue theme, a hand-sewn upholstery fabric cover made by my parents, and a whole collection of handmade elements: pockets, tags, envelopes, a sticker-swatch booklet insert, a writing board, and pages made almost entirely from upcycled and leftover materials.
What we cover
This is a completed journal tour, not a step-by-step tutorial. I flip through every page and element, naming what things are and how they were made, pointing to related videos for the techniques, and sharing the thinking behind how I put pages together — especially around creating writing space and making a sellable journal that still feels rich without becoming too heavy to post.
What you'll learn
How a cohesive color palette holds a junk journal together — I don't usually work this focused on a single color, but running blue fabric, blue accents, and similar upholstery scraps through the whole journal is what makes everything feel like it belongs. You can see the difference between pages that use the theme fabric on tabs and edging versus ones that step away from it slightly — and how even those work because the overall visual thread is there.
How to build writing space into pages that would otherwise have none, including:
- Adding a lined tag or folded insert into a pocket on a decorative map page
- Covering a thin book page with lined paper to create a journaling surface without losing the visual interest underneath
- Using a flip-up page to create a large writing surface that folds away when not in use
How an origami cup envelope works as a full-opening page element — and the one thing you must not do if you want it to open completely (see Tips & gotchas below).
How to make a sticker-swatch booklet insert — I include one of these small plastic-sheet booklets in this journal, and it shows how samples of washi tape and stickers can be stored inside the journal itself, peel off cleanly when you want to use them, and double as a decorative element when the journal is closed. I have a full video on making these and I'll link it below.
Why a writing board at the back of the journal earns its place — it's a simple piece of tea-dyed cardstock with an image sewn on, but it protects pages from paper clips and other raised elements when you're actually writing in the journal. It can also serve as a journaling page in its own right.
How to make pages feel full without making them heavy — the balance between rich-looking elements and a journal that's still practical (and postable) is something I think about with every sellable journal I make. This flip-through is a good illustration of what that balance looks like in practice: bulldog-clipped pieces that can be removed, pockets filled with tags rather than stacked collage layers, and deliberate blank spaces left between elements.
What a sellable handmade journal cover can look like — this cover is upholstery fabric, hand-sewn by my dad, with intricate details and individually hand-sewn beads added by my mum. No glue anywhere on the cover. Seeing this kind of construction up close is useful whether you're making journals to sell or simply want to understand what elevates a cover from pretty to genuinely made.
How to use found and leftover materials across a whole journal, including:
- Baking paper and tea-dyed scraps left over from earlier projects
- A repurposed cutlery holder from an op shop, turned into a pocket page
- A Tiffany & Co envelope used as a decorative envelope element
- Fabric strips from what might have been a sarong, ruffled as page edging
- Vintage playing cards, book pages, map pages, paper doilies, and greeting cards
Tips & gotchas
If you want an origami cup envelope to open up fully as a page element, don't glue it down. That sounds obvious once you know it, but it's the kind of thing you do once — glue it, then watch it refuse to open — and then you remember forever. Leave it unattached and it becomes one of those wonderful elements that unfolds across the whole page.
A writing board protects more than you'd think. When you're writing over a bulldog clip, a charm, or a layered pocket edge, the board slips underneath and gives you a flat, clean surface. It's one of those elements I used to leave out of journals to save space and now include every time.
For journals you plan to sell or post, weight is a real constraint. I reached the point with this journal where I genuinely couldn't add another element without risking it going over the postage limit. The sticker booklet insert was the last thing that went in. If you're making journals to sell, it's worth building that constraint into your decisions as you go rather than at the end.
The 15-minute timer trick is real, and it works. I keep a kitchen timer next to my inking supplies. Set it for 15 minutes, grab a handful of random things from your junk drawer — not curated, just grabbed — take them to your desk, and make something. That's genuinely how the baking paper ended up on a page in this journal: it was in the handful, it makes a wonderful crinkly sound, and that was reason enough.
For me it can be someone's hands in a video, the sound of paper turning, or a tiny detail I glimpse in someone else's work — and then something in me goes oh, yes, that and I have to act on it before the feeling passes. I made this flip-through for anyone who feels the same: not to show you how to copy what's here, but to give you something to look at that might shake something loose. If one element on one page does that — the ruffled fabric, the sticker booklet, the way the cover beads catch the light — then this video has done what I hoped it would.
