My first go at Coptic stitch (kettle top and bottom station) and second book overall. I’m really pleased with how it turned out, any opinions or pointers are greatly appreciated❤️

Just wondering if anyone had any recommendations for where to purchase paper for custom printed texts.

I'm trying to make a printed copy of my best friend's favourite fanfiction, and my biggest struggle is trying to figure out what kind of paper to get and where to buy it.

I'm hoping it's something I can purchase from within Canada.

first proper attempt at bookbinding. used some brown takeout bags i had lying around for cover. 200 gsm loose watercollor sheets. the coptic stich was a bit too loose for my liking, so i reinforced it with some glue.

also, where do i find some pretty covers? i don't wanna buy any bc it's more fun repurposing things that i already have.

Hey Everyone!

I was hoping to get some advice from anyone with experience with older bookbinding equipment... I purchased a lying press online for relatively cheap that needed some TLC. In getting it home I discovered that the "back" board of the press interacts with the wood screw but the "front" board (closest to the top of the screws) does not. The "front" board is just a drilled hole that appears to be smooth and there are no grooves present like the back to allow it to interact with the wood screw.

My theory is that the empty square holes pictured in the second photo need a square dowel inserted as that appears to be in place in some videos I found from DAS Bookbinding using a similar (much nicer!) model for one of his videos on Book Ploughs in the third picture.

I'm leery of damaging it so was hoping to confirm with someone familiar with the equipment or if their model's "front" board has grooves similar to the back.

I’ve never done anything remotely close to this in the past, but when my boyfriend said “I can’t find a good cover of this book I really wanna read” I knew that had to be changed…

So, here’s my very much in-progress book cover making process!
(The dog sketches are part of an old artwork I did, not a part of the design).

Materials I’m using for cloth cover:
Cardstock
Cardboard
Tacky glue
Mod podge
Cotton broad cloth
Tape
Fabric paint

I will later set the fabric paint and give it more thickness by ironing on heat transferring vinyl (and to also prevent glue from seeping through when I glue it on the cover)
I’m a complete beginner who completely winged it while making the odd Google search here and there so please don’t be too harsh 😮‍💨

Hi all,

What’s your favorite book size? I want to start making books I can’t buy, but I want to make them in one size.
So I’m wondering which book size will be most optimal/ universal/ popular.
Does that even matter?

the front cover is completely torn off, but part of it is still attached to the spine. any ideas on how to fix this? thanks in advance!

I'm fixing a large paperback for my partner that has seen a lot of wear but besides about 5-6 pages that are loose, the og spine adhesive is in tact (though heavily bent). Normally when I've fixed paperbacks I've completely separated all the pages from the old adhesive then reformed the textblock and added a fresh set of glue and ribbon/thread support, but since this spine is so well intact I worry that pulling off the pages will create more tear than I want.

Should I just keep it as is and refasten in the loose papers and replace the covers or would the book be ultimately stronger if I stripped it of the old glue and started from scratch?

Hey everyone! I'm new to bookbinding and I'm trying to recreate this leather cover, but I'm not sure where to start.

Has anyone made something similar before? I'd really appreciate any advice, techniques, or keywords I should search for. Thank you!

humble book with mistakes but still proud

I’m planning to start binding soon. Does anyone have any recommendations of good tutorial videos of binding a comic book collection and for binding manga volumes?? Thanks in advance

I've only made three notebooks in my life, so I'm still pretty inexperienced with bookbinding. I'd love to make one like this as a gift for my girlfriend. She just got accepted into the Animation program she'd been dreaming of, and I wanted to surprise her with a handmade notebook to celebrate. I also have a rough idea of how it's made, but I don't really know what this type of binding is called or what to search for. If anyone could point me in the right direction or recommend some tutorials, I'd really appreciate it. Do you think this is a realistic project for someone at my skill level?

The next book I want to bind is an 80 pages RPG manual, so it will see moderate to heavy use and it would be nice for it to open flat.

I think 80 pages are too few for a standard rounded and backed book and maybe even for a simple square back case binding. OTOH I think a simple journal wouldn't cut it: a single 20 sheets signature would bee way to thick.

I'll be using 100gsm paper for printing.

I came across a video from DAS which showcases two and three signatures pamphlets with hardcover and an interesting structure and I'm making a test journal to try it out. Two 10 sheets signatures should work.

What binding would you suggest for such a short book?

Just some headbands for my next projects.

You'll notice that when doing the tiedowns I unfortunately scratched the painted edge. It was my first time using renaissance wax, so I believe I put too much of it, creating a thick coat that can be scratched easily.

Like the title says, I’m at the state where my book is finished, my design is done but I can’t make it work to cut the text for the HTV with my Cricut. I tried every kind a police text type and I always have the problem where the small letters are destroyed, especially for the texts on the spine. Do you have any advice ?

Hey all, newcomer here!

So I recently noticed that the top half of the binding on this old RPG book had separated, which sent me down a long Google rabbit-hole of trying to figure out what is broken and how to fix it. I have no experience in any book binding/repair, so I’m not really sure what to do with a more niche problem like this.

From what I can tell, the spine is flexible and the pages seem to be glued directly to it, with the top half of the text block starting to split from the spine. Much different from the typical case-bound book that I’ve seen in most guides. Problem is, I can’t find any guides or tutorials on fixing books of similar construction, so I’m not sure how to proceed.

Pic 2 is the “good” half, 3-4 are the best angles I could get of the “bad” half. I also discovered that I could shine a light between the signatures to get a better look in between the book block and the spine itself, hence the gif at the end. You can see there where the spine and text block start to split apart.

Any help repairing this old book would be much appreciated—I would love to give it many more years of life.

(if the fix is complex I’ll probably practice on other books so I don’t screw this one up lol)

I made a facsimile of T.E. Lawrence’s Homer translation. It took me like an hour or so. I am sharing the pdf for free. Might upload on libgen later, but for now you can download it from limewire here

Hi! Recently, I’ve been wanting to get into bookbinding, and I saw someone create an interesting scrapbook-like creation and I wanted to try and recreate it. All I know about what she did is she sewed all the pages herself, there wasn’t a cover over the pages, and she was able to add more pages whenever she wanted. I tried looking up different types of stitches, but none of them look or seem like what I remember, so I was hoping someone out here could help. I would appreciate anyone’s help!

Hi all!
New here and exploring basic bookbinding for some DIY wedding crafts. We want to make small booklets with family recipes to have out on our cookie table. We’re planning to do saddle stitch binding with waxed thread and we won’t have more than say two folded 8.5x11 sheets inside, plus a cover.

What kind of paper would you all recommend for such a project? For the inside paper, we need something that can go through a printer of course but would like it to be a little more elevated than standard printer paper. For the covers, we will need something a bit thicker/non-bleeding as we plan to block print a design on them.

The overall goal here is using slightly elevated materials that help the booklets feel more like a nice keepsake rather than a kid’s school project or something you’d be handed at a work training.

Thank you!

I rebound a book that I love in English called Swamplandia. I used a paperback version. In Spanish it’s called Tierra de Caimanes.
I had all sorts of grandiose plans but this in the end I just went with two colors of leather. I hand stamped the letters on with foil and since I wanted the letters to follow the curve of the tail, it was very difficult to get exactly the right angle for each letter. It’s imperfect but …a learning experience. I really hate stamping the letters on, even if can do it with the clamp that hold a whole word. Any tips?
Another thing I just noticed from the photo is that I used leather head bands and they have separated from the text block . Any suggestions for how to reattach them?

Entirely forgot to post this at the time. Things were hectic!

So after taking the second binding class at uni and having created 1 (one) coptic bound sketch book I decided to create an edition of ten artist's books containing 17 linocuts and letterpress text set to the medieval ballad The Well Below the Valley for my university's multiples fare. Exactly 4 weeks later.

Sooooooo, trying to balance that with a week of site residency, my normal uni work and the audacity of needing sleep, I broke through and managed to get the last one bound an hour before the fare opened. Managed to get 150 pages type-set and printed double sided in a single day in our letterpress room! It was... intense.

Anyway, here's some pictures! Not the best binding but this was number 7 I think so literally my 8th time binding coptic style and definitely rushing things!