Eileen Brautman at Work
Videos:
Eileen's Workshop
When Eileen Brautman works her ketubah-making magic in the garage of her South Florida home, she does it in a classically artistic way. It's hard to tell that it was once a garage because of all the art supplies and decorations that help develop the environment necessary to help inspire her creativity.
If you are interested, please check out some of the tools that Eileen uses to create those elaborate ketubot. It's amazing to see how a few simple tools such as a pencil, a ruler, and a sharp knife (and an artistic mind) like Eileen's can craft such beautiful works of art.
"There are no straight lines in nature!" She often uses a ruler to help to ensure that certain aspects of her ketubot stay proportional to each other (and only on rare occasions to create straight lines).
The first step Eileen takes when creating her ketubot is to actually draw it out on the paper with a pencil (this way, if she makes a mistake or changes her mind, she can change it).
This knife is the number one tool that Eileen uses when cutting out her elaborate ketubot. For many things, scissors simply wouldn't work. Trying to cut out a hole only about 5 mm wide in the middle of a piece of paper with scissors could spell disaster for something like a ketubah.
Of course, a ketubah is a contract and contracts must have words. Eileen Brautman, prior to her ketubot-making days, practiced the art of calligraphy. Calligraphic pens need to be refilled with ink, hence the reason why she keeps a bottle on her work desk.
View one of her calligraphic works
Here are some of her final products. You may click them to see larger versions.
