Hobonichi Techo Cover: minä perhonen

minä perhonen makes its own cloth rather than buying it in, dyeing, weaving and embroidering to get hand-drawn designs into textile, and that is what you are paying for here: on all four of these covers the pattern is worked into the fabric, not printed onto it. Akira Minagawa founded the brand in 1995; the name is Finnish for I and butterfly, which is why a butterfly turns up somewhere on every one of them.

Two of the textiles are embroidered onto flat covers with butterfly-stopper pen holders. Felice sets birds and butterflies among flowers, worked in blue thread on a cotton and wool blend, with enough light and shadow in the stitching to read like a woodblock print; its lining is light blue. Skyful reworks a 2014 Hobonichi cover in a colourway made for this one, a sky of stars built from embroidered dots on soft cotton, using two different threads so the surface is both bumpy and uneven in lustre; its lining is a vivid yellow. Both come with two bookmarks strung with small embroidered balls.

The other two are zip covers, which are substantially thicker and hold more. Glass flower layers colour the way a glass painting does, on soft cotton, lined in cream yellow with green and pink bookmarks. Pomppia takes its name from the Finnish for bounce and repeats rabbit faces, each drawn differently, as one continuous pattern; it is yellow thread embroidered into light blue linen, lined in the same yellow, with light blue and pink bookmarks. Both close on a zip with a natural leather pull and a butterfly at the fastening.

Features

• Four textiles: felice, skyful, glass flower and pomppia, in A5 and A6

• Every pattern is woven or embroidered into the cloth rather than printed on it

• Two different bodies: felice and skyful are flat covers with butterfly-stopper pen holders, glass flower and pomppia are zip covers

• That changes the bulk considerably: about 3 mm and 100 g flat against 30 mm and 180 g zipped, in A6

• Two bookmarks on every cover, embroidered balls on the flat ones and coloured ribbon on the zipped

• PU lining throughout, with a natural leather zip pull where there is a zip

• A6 fits the Original, the Planner, the Original Avec and the A6 Day-Free; A5 fits the Cousin, the Cousin Avec and the A5 Day-Free