Book #77

Quarter leather case binding, rounded spine

Using some amazing Japanese Chiyogami paper and dark green leather, I made this book with a case binding, rounded spine, in quarter leather.

Unfinished Project #3

This unfinished project turned into 14 books. Several months ago I started to make these. I prepared all the pages and then got busy with orders and other projects and all those prepared pages were moved onto the shelf of unfinished projects. But here they are, finally.


Fourteen small hardcover journals with mixed papers for the pages. Each book is colour coordinated, so the purple book has a mixture of papers that includes lots of purple, and the blue book has a mixture of papers that includes lots of blue, etc. You get the idea. And I decided to use Japanese Chiyogami on all the covers. Most of the spines are book cloth, but a few are actually leather. Hardcover pamphlet structure; I love making these.


It will take a while to photograph each book individually for Etsy, but I did get a couple of them added to my shop today.

Snow Storm Hardcover Journal

I made this journal a couple days ago for the Trans Canada Etsy Team's February Challenge. The theme of the challenge is Snow since we still have lots of it around the country, even if it was scarce for a few days in Whistler! Visit the TCET blog to vote for your favorite item in our snow-inspired challenge (hint: pick "D"!) This journal has a white leather spine and the covers are finished with beautiful Japanese Chiyogami paper that has fine gold and silver bursts that remind me of whirling snow during a blizzard. There are 256 pages of gorgeous snow white cotton paper with torn edges.

Japanese paper!

The Japanese Paper Place is well known to me even though I've never had an opportunity to visit the physical store - all lovers of Japanese papers will seek out the sources and this is THEE place to get Japanese paper in Canada. Can you imagine having 637 different sheets of Chiyogami all for yourself? Well, here I will increase the chances of me getting 637 such papers in my hands. Over at the Japanese Paper Place online store, they are having a little contest to win this pot of gold!

Happy Thanksgiving, Canada

Happy Thanksgiving to Canadians having turkey or tofurkey from coast to coast. The leaves are turning red and orange and falling all over the ground now. I must have been inspired by the season when I was making this book today, a chain stich binding with autumn flavoured Chyiogami covers: And, on an almost entirely unrelated note, check out the article about the Saint John's Bible project on the B.E.S.T blog. Imagine writing the entire bible by hand, in perfect calligraphic form, illuminated beautifully, using ink you made by grinding pigments, etc etc. Quite a tremendous undertaking. The project has its own website too, at www.saintjohnsbible.org.

Hardcover Pamphlets again

I love making these. They are small hardcover journals with 100 pages (50 sheets) of mixed papers. Pages are a variety of handmade, textured, vellum, printed, recycled, lined, and plain papers in various colours. The purple book has my own hand marbled paper on the covers! There is Japanese Chiyogami used with the red spine and the black spine, and the yellow book is done in full cloth.

New paper and a Teflon folder

Another good mail day. I had recently been shopping online at Hollanders and my stuff arrived today. Of note, is this Teflon folder! A while back I solicited feedback here on my blog about these...y'all convinced me. I don't think I've ever held one in my hand before...it is heavier than I expected. And now I'm ready for anything; but, the only thing I've tried so far was ripping paper - nobody mentioned that it sucks for ripping paper. I'll have to make a box soon just so I can use this thing more effectively.

There is a pile of decorative paper in the background of that photo. My supply of decorative papers needed some refreshing so I was paper shopping as well. I got some great Chiyogami, direct from Japan. I got it on Etsy from FromJapanWithLove. I am always surprised by the speed of shipping from Japan. I am not kidding when I say it arrived faster than most things I buy domestically.

I was paper shopping at Hollanders as well, got some chiyo and some other Japanese papers, some papyrus, some Indian paper, some metallic stuff, and this amazing piece here:


This is a large sheet of paper (24x36 inches) and this photo shows almost the entire sheet so the marble pattern is huge! It is Thai Marble - the description on the Hollanders site: Immense, flowing patterns of Black, Gold, and Silver are created by hand to form this Thai Marble. An occasional imperfection is part of the character and adds beauty and variety. In addition to its many uses, this paper looks great framed as wall art.

I don't have any special plans for any of the papers that I just bought, so I will just hoard them for a while...

My Case-Bound Books

Although it seems like I spend most of my time making books with limp leather covers, I still enjoy a good case bound book from time to time. They are more satisfying than the limp leather books - probably because they are so much more effort! So I recently made four hardcover case-bound books. I am not exactly sure if this particular method of binding and casing in a book has a special name...the spine is sorta hollow, does that make it a hollow back? Probably not...I definitely need some education in this area. But I was pleased with them in the end, regardless.


I tried to do some rounding and backing...although two of the books I was working on here have just 8 signatures and didn't round very well. The two other books had more signatures and my rounding attempts were more successful. But I worked on the spines, attached some false endbands, layered on some pva and paper.... Briefly, I considered the possibility of attempting to sew my own endbands...then the feeling passed, very quickly. Phew.


The fun part of making these books is mixing and matching book cloth, leathers, and Japanese papers in pretty combinations.


I did two books with leather spines, and two with book cloth on the spines. All four have Chiyogami paper on the covers.

Bookbinding 101 - Water Lily Book Tutorial

I prepared a guest tutorial for the Sixth&Elm blog, showing how to make an Origami water lily. Now I have a new tutorial ready showing how to make a book using those water lilies.

Before starting this tutorial, you need to make three water lilies, all the same size, using the "Origami Water Lily Tutorial" first. You'll need some Origami paper to make the water lilies, or any other nice lightweight Japanese paper like the pretty pink paper used in this tutorial. So, go make 3 water lilies, then come back.

A single water lily:


When the three water lilies are finished, attach them to each other, back-to-back. Place one flattened lily in front of you. Apply paste to the flat surface of the lily and stack the second flattened lily on top – make sure to align them so the lilies both open at the same end. Apply glue to the surface of the second lily and stack the third lily on top. When they are all attached, they should open up like the first picture below.

The point where the three lilies meet is the spine of the book. To give it some stability, cut a short and narrow strip of paper and paste it over the spine. Use paper that is the same as the liles or similar in colour to keep it unobtrusive.

Click for larger photos.


Now the text block is finished and the covers can be made.

Cut two covers, the same size and shape as the flattened text block. Use binder's board or heavy cardstock. Also cut two pieces of decorative paper for covering the binder's board. These pieces of paper should be the same shape as the binder's board, but about 10mm wider all the way around. Cover both boards as you would for any other book. If you've never done such a thing before, follow the next few steps.

Once you have the decorative papers cut out, brush paste over the entire surface of the binder's board.


Lay the binder's board paste-side-down onto the back of the decorative paper. The edges of the decorative paper need to be turned in to cover the sides of the board, so start with the two longest edges. Bush paste onto the paper on each side then fold it over the edges.


Cut notches in the paper at each corner. Apply paste to the paper and then fold it over. Cutting the notches first will help the paper lie flat and make neat corners.


When both covers are done, it's a good idea to press them under a weight for a while, perhaps over night, to let the paste dry.

Now the lily-textblock just has to be attached to the covers. Place the flattened lily-textblock in front of you, and brush paste onto the flat surface – don't get any glue on the other parts of the lilies because you don't want them to get stuck together. Place the paste-side of the lilies onto the back of one of the covers. Then brush paste over the other side of the lily-textblock and stack the second cover on top.


That's it, it's done.

The whole thing should be pressed under a weight until the paste is dry. This will do two things: it will consolidate the bond between each of the pasted surfaces and it will prevent the covers from warping.

The water lily book in its plain ordinary closed state:


The water lily book in its fun flourishing open state:



When I first prepared this tutorial, I had completely forgotten where I'd originally seen the idea for this book. I came across it this morning so I wanted to add it here. It was an article by Viva Lloyd in Bound & Lettered. Thanks :-)

A baby boy book

I wanted to make something to include in a gift for a baby boy, and I didn't give myself enough time to make the traditional hardcover photoalbum, which would be a logical choice. But I made a cute leather journal with a light blue cover and tan spine. The paper is heavy 80lb drawing paper and could be used for mounting photos but I think it is best suited as a journal with lots of paraphenailia and "memory items" stuck in it.

The actual binding is a really basic longstitch and kettlestitch, sewn directly through the spine. There is a simple tab closure on the fore edge that slides through a loop on the front cover.

I was rather pleased with this book so I made a couple more. One is dark pink, and one is teal suede. They are all lined on the inside with some super Japanese papers. These would be great pocket-sketchbooks too since they have really nice drawing paper in them.

Three more single quire Coptic books

About a month ago I participated in a workshop about the single quire Coptic books that were discovered in 1945. There were 13 of these books stashed in a jar in Egypt since the 3rd or 4th Century! These books are often called the Nag Hammadi codices. There is a previous blog entry about the workshop.

So this was the next project on my list of historical bindings to do, and I just finished making three of them.

I used leather splits to make these books so they actually have suede covers. The two dark brown books are made with a deerskin split. The white one is a sheepskin split. A leather split is a layer taken off the hide so it is suede on both sides and these ones are quite thin so it worked well for these books.

The covers on the original books were lined with papyrus to stiffen the covers. I didn't have any papyrus, so these are stiffened with just heavy paper. And I used some great Japanese papers as end papers pasted down on the inside of the covers. The best thing about these, is the single quire. The text block is just one thick stack of paper folded in half. These each have 40 sheets of paper (compared to 8 that I normally have per section). I pressed these for a week to get them to stay folded satisfactorily.

I have just two more bindings left on my list of historical bindings to do...

Samples of work 2001-2006

Blue and sage leathers inlaid, lined on the inside with handmade paper. Long stitch binding through the spine and decorative stitching on the covers in white linen. Hardcover multi-signature coptic sewing. Black leather with raised letters on the front. Portfolio case custom fit to this book. I backed the fabric myself. Leather label on the spine with gold lettering. Japanese box. Dark green book cloth with paper lining. This is now my bookbinding toolbox. Japanese wrap-around case, custom fit to these two Japanese butterfly books. Rebound copy of Jonson's Lives of the Poets. Leather spine and new cloth covers. I found this cloth at a drapery store and backed it myself. Leather label on the spine with gold lettering. Rebound copy of the Harvard Concise Dictionary of Music. This was originally a perfect-bound paperback. Brown bookcloth spine and hand marbled papers. Leather label on the spine with gold lettering. Rebound copy of The Cat in the Hat. Scanned then printed the image for the new front covers. One of my first attempts at making a girdle book. 'Our Stars' - Accordian fold artist's book with flaps and pockets, pull-out tags, found images, and quotes. Japanese multi-page scroll. Accordian fold with little pamphlets sewn into some of the valleys. This was made as a birthday card with photos and text. Little Red Riding Hood tunnel book. A case structure, with the tunnel book attached on one side and a pamphlet containing the story attached to the other side. Expirimental binding: sections sewn onto stiff hemp twine. Leather cover. Photo album and matching photo storage box. Japanese chyiogami paper. Japanese stab bindings, hemp leaf pattern.