Dead Letters
Spring 2014 | Updated spring 2015 with a leather cover*
Dead letters is a small accordion-style book, inspired by the letter of a civil war solider and the U.S. postal system of the time period.
The book itself is based on the idea of the postal system during the civil war, and how many letters were lost, destroyed, or sent to the Dead Letters Office (where undecipherable mail goes, stays, or is returned from). Most letters in this book were final farewell’s, documentation of lost mail, or letters announcing the death of a solider.
To reinforce the concepts of this book, each envelope was carefully sized to match those of the time period and names were hand written with traditional pen and ink on the exteriors. The end sheets also feature an illustration for Harpers Weekly by Winslow Homer, News From The War, June 14,1862.
*The leather cover was custom made for this book by Innovative Journaling (formerly Renaissance Arts at the time of the construction).
