Tiny books

How to practice the techniques of bookbinding in a non-resource-intensive manner?

Tiny books!  Each is about 2.5" tall and 1.5" wide.  The pages were cut from sheets of tracing paper (which is suitably thin for this scale).

The first is a traditional book on raised cords with a scrap of leather on the spine, and scraps of marbled paper on the covers.  Observe: my first successful French groove!

For the second, I decided to try a coptic binding.  The first such binding I saw was a revelation; a book that shows off the stitching of its own spine?  Wait—you can do that?

Yes.  Yes, you can.  My first try was a little sloppy around the headbands, but I intend to get better.  Here's what it looks like from the inside:

I may add a ribbon to hold it closed; I think my stitches were a little too tight, because this one loves to fly open.  Like a puppy with an open door, I sweartogod.

The next project, currently in the works, is a rose-themed notebook with tear-out pages.  The paper is handmade and contains real rose petals.  Which...might be kind of hard to write on, but I'm counting on it being cool enough that nobody will mind.  (There aren't that many of them.)

The Tome, part VI: Completion

(Enter BINDER, who clears throat.)

BINDER: Allow me to present to you...the Tome, a hand-bound book in its final state.

(Enter BOOK.)

BINDER: It seems to be a little shy, but we'll soon fix that.  For the moment, you can see more here than you might think: the dapper red ribbon, the hand-stitched headband, a bit of Brian's handwriting, the pattern on the endpapers.  A book has a lot to say in its edges and corners.

Still, if you'll bear with me, perhaps I can convince it to show its cover.

(aside, whispering) Only a corner?  All right, that's fine, but you must get it together soon, promise? (addresses audience) We're still getting over our nerves, but here's a detail of the leather.  The headcap was shaped with a piece of yarn and the leather was pressed down around a knotwork relief on the front.  Now let's see if...

Aha!  So, it's not entirely spineless after all!  I think it may be ready.  Ladies and gentlemen...the leatherbound cover of Brian's Tome!

Here you see featured in relief the writer's coat of arms: a sword, two olive branches, and a shield.  Parts of the branches were stamped onto the leather; the rest was pressed down around those cardboard forms I so painstakingly carved.  Beneath you'll find the volume number.  That's correct, Volume I; for I don't expect this man to soon stop writing.  Perhaps next year I'll make Volume II and see how far my craft has come.

Lifting the cover, we get a look at the handsomely marbled endpapers. (As usual, you may click for a larger view of the image.)

Though not hand-marbled, these papers are a step above printed papers and no two are quite the same.  This picture lets you see how the endpapers, ribbon, and headbands have been coordinated in a red-black-yellow scheme.

Now, turning the page...

...we find that the book has been given a title—a nod to the Doctor's own Journal of Impossible Things.

The writer has already begun his work in this volume, but I'm afraid that's not yet ready for display.  We can hope that someday, perhaps, something written in this volume will be lucky enough to catch some publisher's eye; when that happens, I will most certainly show you the manuscript.

(BINDER gives a bow.  Exeunt BINDER and BOOK.)

Thanks for watching.

Go to: Part V | Retrospect

In retrospect...

Of course my first two book projects featured a lot of mistakes. (Finished pictures of the second one are coming, I promise. It's just...there's this thing my camera does where it sucks...)

Anyway, I thought it would be good to go over the things I screwed up and will try to fix for next time. Learning curve, go!

The LotR Poetry Book

Find new cords for the spine.  The hemp yarn I used felt like the right strength and thickness, but its lumpy, tangled fibers were frustrating to fray out for pasting onto the cover boards.  The yarn was also dyed, so wet glue picked up the color and became a vessel for blue stains all over my pages.  I need to find undyed cord with straight, uniform fibers.

Stitch on handmade headbands.  The book looks unfinished without a headband, and no place near me sells the pre-made strips.  I did put a headband on the journal project, but see my comments there; it still needs work.

Allow room for a French groove.  Like headbands, the French groove and raised shoulders next to the spine, which seem to result from a combination of text block backing and careful cover board placement, add a touch of finish and class to the book.  Next time, I'll place the cover boards a little further from the spine to leave room for the groove; but see also this post explaining how to achieve the groove with a split coverboard.

Find an appropriate cloth for the spine.  The red paper I found for the covers is absolutely perfect, both in its vibrant crimson hue and its impressed cloth texture, but the black jeans material on the spine drops the ball.  It's too thick, for one thing, so the unshapely headcap looks even worse with cloth puckering at the corners.  For another, the dense weave picks up whatever dandruff and fluff comes its way.  Lesson learned; just get proper book cloth, available from places like Hollander's, or at least use something thin.

Be glue-conscious.  As careful as I was, it wasn't enough...I got a huge smudge all over the spine cloth, and a few flecks on the title page.  Wax paper and EXTREME caution are required when handling glue.

Embellish the content. The published LotR books universally feature a rich tradition of illustrations and accents from Tolkien's hand. Mine uses only his monogram on the cover, and a very simple three-circle motif on the section headers. Normally I espouse minimalism, BUT the title page, bland as it is, would benefit from an ornament like this Eye of Sauron motif.  Basically, don't under-decorate; the book needs some complexity, especially to fit into a wider tradition.

Learn to hot-stamp gold leaf.  The monogram is already getting scratched, so the adhesive in the kit I bought is under suspicion.  I may have to saw an aluminum stamp and try the advice in this wonderful, illustrated tutorial.

The Tome

Pay attention to paper grain.  This didn't occur to me until I found admonitions published in various tutorials.  Apparently the book goes together much better when the paper grain—of the pages, the cover board, covering material, endpapers, everything—runs vertically.  With this project, I didn't have much wiggle room; to use the full extent of my ledger-size paper, I had no choice but to fold my paper a certain way.  In the future, I'll tend to prefer square or oversize sheets which can be oriented as necessary to suit grain.

Sewing thread is no good for headbands.  Well, unless maybe it's really thick.  Waxed thread is also preferable, else the fibers will start to fray out and look messy.

Use low relief for raising a design under leather.  Even the edge of my kraft-paper hinge was visible through the leather, whereas too high of a relief makes it VERY difficult to mold the leather properly around the design.  A thin applique (only a few paper-widths) is quite sufficient to raise a design under leather; consider this journal, where the edges of the applique seem also to be tapered.  (A higher relief for bands on the spine is fine, as no detail is at risk.)

Not really a mistake, but something I learned on this one: Flour paste is basically awesome.  I still used a lot of PVA glue, which sets more quickly, but flour paste is nice when pasting paper to paper.  It's also ridiculous and fun to see how food becomes a useful structural component of a book.

So, that's all for now.  I'm not really sure what my next project will be, but I've got a lot of materials on hand now.  I'll probably make a journal or a rebound trade paperback, as those are the most marketable options.

The Tome: a quick update

Let's start with good news, then proceed to bad news with a positive spin.

The good news is, I've finished applying the leather and endpapers on Brian's journal. It looks gorgeous and the leather is wonderful to touch; I'm very pleased. So was he.

Now, the bad news: I already gave it to him. More to the point, I don't have pictures yet. Yet. But now he's already started writing it and so, when I do get pictures, they'll be pictures of the book in use. See? Positive spin. Bam.

The Tome, part V: Right, so this part is nervewracking

I'm applying the leather. Like, right this second. I ran upstairs to do a post while waiting for a section to dry.

Scary! But so far, it's going okay; in fact, it's more beautiful than I could ever have hoped. Look how the structure of the cords shows through on the front. I'm surprised that's visible, but I think it looks awesome.

Go to: Part IV | Part VI

The Tome, part IV: Preparing the cover

Remember how I said this book was going to have to be leatherbound? Well, it is, and now I have the leather. For this, I went to Ann Arbor last Saturday to pay homage to Hollander's Store of All Things Bookish and Beautiful. Seriously, they have everything. Try not to drool on the very expensive papers. (There, now you have my birthday wish list.)

They did have some of the best bookbinding leather, which is morocco goatskin, but it was prohibitively expensive and I don't think I'm exactly worthy of it yet. Instead, I brought home a small hide of calf leather in black, along with a sheet of French marbled paper for the endpapers.

To practice working the leather, I overlaid a scrap onto a carved block of wood, producing the J. R. R. Tolkien monogram in the photo. At this point, I started feeling a little overwhelmed by the magnitude of my first leather project. I very nearly chickened out and revised my plan to a quarter-bound book, using leather only on the spine and that marbled paper as the cover material. However, while that would still be good-looking and no doubt wiser, I don't think it would satisfy what I hoped to achieve with this journal. Remember, it has to be

• of an epic scale and
• ornate,

and furthermore, as per Brian's hints and nudges, it should ideally incorporate

• some Celtic knotwork,
• his 40k coat of arms, and
• a volume number (he'll have more birthdays).

If tooling, stamping, and/or gold leafing can be worked into that arrangement, all the better.

So, I reconsidered and came up with a feasible design. The main feature will be a raised insignia; I expect that such dimensionality will add an extra sense of weight to the tome, and besides, it's easier than tooling. The design is intentionally massive and not terribly detailed—or, as I like to think of it, uncluttered—which will be easier on my novice hands. However, I still find it aesthetically pleasing.

The olive branches and volume number will be tooled. Whether this will involve more or less work than cutting out the cardboard for the raised areas, I couldn't say, because that was an absolute pain.

Have a look at the spine, which will feature raised bands, and at the ribbon marker poking out from under the headband:

Right, so, the next step is to cover it all with leather. Wish me luck!

Go to: Part III | Part V