Introduction to Bookbinding Supplies and Materials
There are lots of different bookbinding supplies, materials, tools and equipment. This post presents a review of many of these.
There are lots of different bookbinding supplies, materials, tools and equipment. This post presents a review of many of these. Continue reading →
These past days I’ve been digging into piles of my old and new stuff. Heaps of bookbinding paper and documents, power tools, pieces of wood and lots of other things. Just in two weeks, we are moving to Amsterdam, and all our possessions had to be sorted, separated and evaluated. Many of them went to garbage, some we are taking with us. Dealing with many things that were stored for a long time without moving made me experience the worst sort of allergy I had in a long time. Continue reading →
My handmade paper recently received an impressive upgrade. Anastasia Golovina, an architect and an artist from Moscow, improved it with these enchanting houses. It is even more impressive as I never considered myself a true papermaker.
The following instructions form the first part of the City & Guilds Level 1 Unit 118 Course in Bookbinding. Reproduced with the consent of Shepherds Bookbinders who own all rights. A downloadable PDF copy of this course can be found here.
Here are a few commonly used bookbinding terms. Learning these basic terms and phrases will help you understand the exercises covered later in this post. Along with the principle of ‘Grain Direction’, and ‘Learning about Paper’ a little time spent reading these simple definitions will help you make informed choices when ordering materials and equipment.
NOTE: You might also want to check out our post ‘The Basics of Bookbinding‘ which gives a comprehensive breakdown of all the tools and equipment you’ll likely need for your journey into bookbinding.
Identifying the origins of a manuscript is a notoriously subjective art, one that requires an impressive visual memory and an exceedingly trained eye that can quickly spot the telltale details which hint at certain artists, periods, and locations.
I have a copy of The Fair Penitent by Nicholas Rowe, published in 1776. I found it in a rare bookstore. It has no boards, barely any spine left, and the frontispiece has been cut out. Continue reading →
As the name implies, a dust jacket can keep your work safe from dirt, wear and other sort of damages. The first step in constructing dust jacket is to select an appropriate paper that is similar to the book for which you are creating a jacket. Now measure the complete wraparound dimensions of the book. Cut a strip of paper that is about five inches wide, and crease it along the edges. Secure the paper in place with a clip as shown in figure 112. Wrap this paper around your book; pull it tight and tuck the loose end on the other side of the cover. All along, make well defined creases on the paper strip as you turn it over the book. Now remove the strip, and you would be able to see six distinct creases on it. In a similar manner, measure the height of the book with another strip of paper. The creases that are formed on the paper when you wrap it around have been illustrated in figure 113. Use these measurements to create a layout of the jacket on a separate sheet of paper. While doing this, measure the width of the flaps and ensure that it is almost one third of the cover width. If your book size is smaller, the flap width should be even more than this as shown in figure 114. Continue reading →
The project I spent most time designing last year was the book scanning frame I'm already selling at iBookBinding's Etsy store. As it often happens, it started as an instrument I planned to use myself. However, It soon grew to be much more than that.
Recently one of my students asked me how to remove cigarette smell from books. I’m quite lucky not to have faced that problem ever in my life. My close relatives and I do not smoke, and I never bought any second hand things that needed deodorizing. Continue reading →
The boards having been squared, they are to be attached to the book by lacing the ends of the cord through holes made in the board. The boards are to be laid on the book with their backs in the groove and level with the head; they must then be marked either with a lead pencil or the point of a bodkin exactly in a line with the slips, about half an inch down the board. On a piece of the wood the mill board is placed, and holes are pierced by hammering a short bodkin through on the line made, at a distance from the edge in accordance with the size of the book. About half an inch away from the back is the right distance for an octavo. The board is then to be turned over, and a second hole made about half an inch away from the first ones. The boards having been holed, the slips must be scraped, pasted slightly, and tapered or pointed. Draw them tightly through the hold first made and back through the second. Tap them slightly when the board is down to prevent them from slipping and getting loose. When the cords are drawn through, cut the ends close to the board with a knife, and make the board close on the slips and hold them tight. The slips should be well and carefully hammered, as any projection will be seen with great distinctness when the book is covered. The hammer must be held perfectly even, for the slips will be cut by the edge of it used carelessly. Continue reading →
Designing and updating the old designs of the tools and jigs I sell at our Etsy shop is a constant process that never ends. At every moment I have two or three new things in development, but I never forget about the older items.
Spine rounding tools are used to… round spines of covers when one is making case bound books. Alternatively, they may be used to form a rounded spine of a book block. Continue reading →
This new era of 3d-printed things is finally drawing upon me and my bookbinding workshop. I’m already using some plastic star knobs to tighten simple presses (and plan to start selling these modified versions pretty soon at my Etsy store). Continue reading →
I suppose bonefolder to be an archetypal bookbinder’s tool. I know other artisans use them too; still, making books without a bonefolder proves to be not so comfortable and neat. Continue reading →
This episode of our Bookish Talk is a bit unusual because we have a guest. Rachel Ward-Sale is an award-winning bookbinder with many years of experience and the current president of the Designer Bookbinders.