Bookbinding Update | Week 20

Well this week was a catch up week, which meant I was able to finish my ribbon book and my packed sewing sample.

The former was a little disappointing as when I stuck the ribbons down, they were rather tight and pull the cover back on itself quite a lot, so it took me a while to sort all this out and loosen the ribbons, and unfortunately that meant taking apart the cover a few times. So after all that, it is now looking like a bit of a worn out paperback and a bit scruffy. Mph.

The latter was also not great, but a bit more fun to do, and I’m not overly concerned with the lack of beauty. The problem was, that doing it using black pipe cleaners and black thread, is that you can’t really see all that much, and the fluff has a tendency to come through on the pipe cleaners. So overall on that one, its quite nice and colourful, but a bit amateur – won’t be using pipe cleaners again I don’t think.

Bookbinding Update | Week 19

Well – I finished my box, and am pretty proud of it! My teacher loves it which is always a good thing, she always likes us to use papers that we have made, so the fact it is covered in my splish splash paper made her very happy! (I uploaded a picture of the splish splash paper a while back, hopefully you will recognize it in its transformed state!)

Most importantly, the book fits, which is fantastic! Unfortunately it still doesn’t stand up on its own the right way up (its upside down here), but we will skim over that problem – its tricky with such a thin box, but in future there will be no excuse. I just have to snip off my excess ribbons and its complete! 

I am really very pleased with it – there are a couple of things that annoy me, they may not be noticeable to many, but they niggle at me – still – next time it will be better.

Anyway – pictures…

Bookbinding Update | Week 18

Here is the product of last nights activity. I had to take more pics than usual during the evening, otherwise I’ll never rember how to do this again, I may have to make another one, just to practice it at home!

Anywho, this is the slipcase for my ribbon book (limp binding), and praise the lord, the book fits! Unfortunately after this, the second test for a good slip case is if it stands up on its own (the first being the fit of the book!) and sadly mine did not pass this second test, when covering it with cartridge paper, I was able to build it up a bit at the bottom, but whether that will make any difference, we will see next week. The worry over the slightly narrowing head and tail was infact mostly unfounded (though it may have something to do with it not standing up on its own), but luckily it all stuck quite well and the end result is not bad.

Its a little snug, so it remains to be seen whether the book will still fit once I’ve properly covered it, but fingers crossed. I’ve also attached the paper I was planning on covering it with – what do you think?

Bookbinding Update | Week 17

Well last night was a mixture of emotions, good and bad!

The bad bit was not disastrous, but not fantastic either really – we were making the slip cases for our project 1 limp bindings (the one with the ribbons) and we had to trim the edges, which on mine are very narrow. The edges on mine should really be 12mm all round, but I think they are out a bit which is really annoying, especially as two of them seem to be 12mm at one end and 12.5/13mm at the other, so I think my box may end up being a bit skew-whiff. More worryingly than that, we were told to use the front and back of our boxes as a guide, which mean that my covers are a bit out. Mmph – am not impressed.

On some happier notes, I took all my stuff in that I’ve done so far, and it was all ticked off as OK – I think I may make another disappearing spine book (that was the one with the owl on the front) as the one I did was a little skew, and I should be better at it by now. I’ve also got to do some more art work, printing, mark making, voids etc, all the stuff I’m not that good at!

Most excitingly of all, we were given our project 2’s, which we’ll start this term and do next as well – so a massive project which will end in a proper bound book. The project uses books provided by the Folio Society – they initially give unbound books to the society of Designer Bookbinders for their annual competition, the ones we have are left overs of these. I’ve got Journey to the Centre of the Earth, which I’ve photographed below and you’ll see has PICTURES!! Amazing pictures – its very exciting! I have to design end papers, and the cover, so need to read the book – has anyone got an old tatty copy? It won’t be done using leather as I have no experience in leather, but still very exciting all the same!

C&G Week 14 | Lacing onto limp boards

So I didn’t get an awful lot done on Tuesday, I had a bit of a panic that it would all go wrong – lack of confidence – however, I managed to overcome it in the end and get going again, perhaps it was first day jitters! It seems the further you go on a book, the more is at stake, one thing could easily go wrong! 

The first ribbons are now laced so the cover is not going anywhere. For the rest of the lacing I was thinking of some sort of checker board with voids, but I’m not entirely sure how to do it. We start the slip case next week which is quite exciting!

C&G Week 13 | Paper Decoration and Limp Binding

I have managed to finish folding the cover of my limp binding, I still have to trim the corners so it fits together well, but I thought I would give that a go over Christmas and see how I do.  

I also managed to make some siding papers for my slip case (what covers both sides of the slip case) – which you can see below hanging over the chair. The second one isn’t as good as this one, but they aren’t too bad. As you can see it is all very black and white, which I like. I might do some more of this sort of stuff, I quite like it, I might see if I can mingle some sparkle in it for wrapping paper! – You’ll just have to wait and see – ooh the anticipation is probably killing you!

The ribbons will come through the cover (cloudy paper) and make some sort of design on the front. This is the bit I am struggling with at the moment, and I don’t know what to do – I have potential to do something quite exciting, as I have a lot of ribbons and they are all nice and long, but I can’t think of anything. I was thinking about some sort of spider-web/cross over design, but if anyone as any ideas, let me know – I’m all ears!