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davidanaandrake — Book Binding Tutorial
Published: 2012-01-08 05:28:57 +0000 UTC; Views: 20470; Favourites: 663; Downloads: 613
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Ok, so, wow, this has taken me ages to get around to, and two days to actually do, photograph and put together in tutorial form.This is my cheaty bookbinding method.
I have no machines or nice paper/card suppliers, so I kind of have to adapt what others do so they work for me. The most expensive bit to buy via this method is probably the duct tape.
I hope it's clear enough. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask me. I'll go-a-searching later on after dinner to find the tutorials I learned from and adapted to do this method.
Also, disclaimer: I am not a professional book binder, at least not in the proper way. I do my best to make them very pretty and work, but I'm not professionally trained (I'm self-trained), and I have no machines or gear or whatever else. So, please don't take this tutorial as the be-all and end-all of how to do book binding. I'm an amateur.
That said, I worked really hard on this, it's my gift to for catching my kiriban.
EDIT: I see my typical long sentences, typos and overly wordiness has not taken a break for this tutorial. I'm sorry. Can't fix it now., will attack it again later and perhaps add a few more pictures so we can keep the names for parts of the book construction consistent.
>.< Sorry.
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Comments: 86
Wooow!
I've been meaning to try bookbinding for a while now - I want to try japanese stab binding as well.
So thanks for the tutorial!!
I can't wait until I can go to the craft store and get some materials to try it out. I'll let you know how it goes.
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You should look around dA at the various book binding communities, there's bound to be some other tutorials! There might even be one for the stab-binding method.
Also, thankee for the fav.
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I shall do that. 
You're welcome!!
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You have been featured in
Burning The Midnight Oil !!
Please 
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I love this! It's a beautiful book and a great tutorial that I'll definitely give a try at. I'm new to bookbinding and hadn't even considered duck tape as an option. I like it!
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How many pages is this book I'm part of a writing club and were trying to make a book with about 70 pages
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The book I did for this tutorial had 100 sheets in the book. However, you can use the tutorial to make books of any size and page number. With the model I used in this tutorial, you'd need 35 sheets of A4 paper, folded into 7 signatures.
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Thanks I'll start on the prototype right away and post it when It's done. you said the Tutorial took you 2 days how long does it normally take you?
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To make a book? Um. Maybe three or four hours, not including the time it takes to let the glue dry at different stages. I usually do it over two days because of the drying that is required. Generally, attaching the end pages to the cover board and the block of pages needs to dry overnight after the first end page is done. And I almost always leave the book to dry overnight again when it's completed. But that all depends on the type of glue you're using.
Good luck!
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Thank you so much!
I haven't had that much time to work on it but I just finished the stitching i don't think it would take as long as it did for me if I could only work on it continuously; oh well.
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:3 You'll get there.
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Do you mind if I use this? I love neat little notebooks and things.
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OF COURSE!
It's posted for people to use!
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Yay! Now I can make myself a neat little whatchamajigger to write my conlang journals in
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Mhaha, duct tape spine! Would've never thought of that!
I'm going to offer two little suggestions, and I hope you're not offended...
- When you're punching your signatures, you can use a mold; one piece of paper you reuse in every signature. That way, the signatures will all line up perfectly. Unless you don't want that, off course.
- The distance you leave between the corner and where you cut should be twice the thickness of your board. That's apparently some kind of golden rule in bookbinding. First, fold and glue the top and bottom parts, then the side flap. This prevents extra thickness on the bottom that could wear the paper out while standing on a shelf.
It looks good btw, did I already mention that? It's funny how you use firm card for the endpapers, while I use twice the thickness of printing paper max. It's difficult to glue, but it makes a fine hinge and i love how it shows the folded over pieces of paper underneath
Thanks for showing me your way!
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Just like with my writing I appreciate feedback and suggestions for improvement. So, no, I'm not offended. :3 I'm almost totally self-taught, so it's good to know the "industry standards" from folks who know.
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That's actually really cool. I did a subject on printing and finishing techniques last semester, and I always thought that book binding looks cool, but you have to get it done professionally. This is a really great handmade alternative!
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It's quite possible to do it yourself and make it look professional. You probably need a few more tools and skills if you want to do the leather bound or the speciality-type books, like a witches Book of Shadows etc., but a modern looking notebook isn't too hard. Just takes a little practise. It's amazing what we can do ourselves. :3
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This is a really nice tutorial! 
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I dislike piercing and threading pages. The rest is kind of fun... unless I screw up the glue.. that's annoying. XD
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Two words: Sewing machine.
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XD If I had a sewing machine, I'd totally try that out!
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Ah, maybe Santa will bring you a sewing machine some time. 
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And you don't use overly expensive equipment so I definitely feel inspired right now. I have some card that I need to use up. Now all I need is something fancy to go over it.
And we need more glue. ALL THE GLUE. Haha, I hope I can post a journal on dA soon!
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:3 Thank you!
You could get out some paints and paint your own cover? Just, if you use duct tape, either glue paper over the tape, or perhaps paint normal paper and then glue it onto the card. Duct tape does NOT hold paint, at ALL. XD
<3 I hope you do post it! I'd love to see it.
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Oooh, there's an idea! That won't be able to happen until I'm done school. But I'm making sure I still keep some spending money from work. Noted!
Where do you get your cardstock? I usually have to cut my own and they never turn out perfectly. Do people sell precut cardstock?
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It depends on how many books I need to make. If I'm just making one, and that one needs proper art paper (like your awesome book with those neato scripts on it), I buy a Bockingford (or however you spell it) proper art pad, and the card on the back of those art pads is really thick and excellent for books and I only have to measure and cut it in half. If I have a few books that perhaps don't need to be as high quality, I'll buy a big block of box card from the stationary store (we have one here called the Stationary Warehouse that's good, but I don't know if it's an international brand or not). The card come in, like, A0-sized sheets and I have to measure and cut them to size by hand, which is a total pain in the ass but cheaper than buying a $15 art block. I find there are some other A4-sized art blocks that have good backing card, but others arn't so good, if they bend when you hold them at the bottom, they're not really strong enough for book covers. At one point I was also using craft foam sheets for covers, but they only worked if I was binding a really thick book and the gluing was a pain because the foam sucked up the glue and dried with a bend in it. I'd say, get some cheap paper and experiment with different kinds of card, the whole thing depends on what your goals are for the books. Just random notes books don't need fancy covers, so you can get away with cheap materials and thinner card for the covers, but if you're doing fancy presentations for school/college, you'll need to find a good stationary shop and buy some box card and a craft knife to cut it up.
There are shops here in NZ where you can buy pre-cut box card, but I can't get to them as they're in the city (I'm about 1.5 hours drive from the nearest city). There are some places online that might supply you. If you want I can search through my old links and find the NZ one I found, it might cost a bit in postage but their stuff is freaking amazing, especially their papers. (It's actually where I got the covers for your book from.)
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