Little Books in My Creative Workspace

Today I continued my new project of making a little book…that actually turned into making multiple little books. I took the paper I had and tried the gluing method. I didn’t have two clamps, so used my heavy duty hole puncher to weigh down the stack of little papers as I drenched glue on the binding. I’ll have to wait for it to dry completely and see if this method holds well enough.

Since I wanted to try more methods of binding the pages together, I cut some more paper, but this time using regular Fabriano drawing paper, creating 4 page signatures. Signatures are just sheets of paper folded in half that will be bound together to form your entire book. In this case, I’m not being very technical about it, like checking the grain of the paper – too lazy! All the rules of bookbinding that you learn have a really good reason to be a rule…it really does matter in the end. However, it all just depends how picky you are about your book and what you will be using it for. I’m pretty flexible because it just depends what I feel like doing at the moment – I skip steps when I get impatient or when I feel like the precision won’t be worth it for the project.

However, one thing I never skip is the pre-punching of holes. Otherwise, you aren’t exactly going to be able to sew the signatures together. It’s sort of a tedious process that is super boring, especially if you have a lot of signatures…but it makes the next step of sewing a lot smoother.

I tried sewing one little book of signatures together, but sort of messed up somewhere in the process – you can see the line of thread on the outside binding below. No worries since it’ll be covered up in this project. After going through the process of sewing it, I realized I had the same problem of not knowing how to attach it to the leather cover – oif!

My hands got really tired from the sewing and poking, so I’m going to continue tomorrow. I have more paper for an even smaller book that I’ll try to sew straight into the leather cover, but I’ll have to finish these first two. Check back in for the results tomorrow…hopefully one method or another will work properly. In other updates…I realized that I’ve been drawing a bird a day for 5 weeks now! I’m proud of myself for keeping to the routine and I like how a daily thing, even if it’s just 5 minutes, adds up to so much before you even know it. Who doesn’t want to have stuff done without realizing? Let’s see, otherwise I’m just doodling in my art journal…realizing drawing a million circles can be super tiring…and feeling like I have no time again because suddenly dinnertime is here. Yikes…gotta go!

Posted on April 15, 2010 at 7:55 pm | bookbinding, work in progress

4 Responses to “Little Books in My Creative Workspace”

christina rayevich says:

April 15, 2010 at 9:42 pm

your art journal looks so fun! You are very brave with the book binding, I don’t think I will ever try that lol =) I was looking at your etsy shop, you style is very cute!
Thanks for stopping by my bloggity!
xo

Reply
- linda says:
  
  April 16, 2010 at 9:24 am
  
  Thanks so much, it’s a bit of challenge, because I’m not precise when it comes to cutting. I have my old school rusty xacto knife and such…haha! Thanks for stopping by, I really appreciate it.
Nancy Wilson says:

April 16, 2010 at 12:55 pm

Hello Linda, I have been out of town for a few days so I missed your introduction on europeanstreetteam. Welcome to a California girl living in Italy from a California girl living in France! Your blog is really great. I too love making books. I look forward to following your progress. My etsy store: http://www.etsy.com/shop/atelierconti my blog: http://ateliermaisonconti.blogspot.com/

Reply
- linda says:
  
  April 16, 2010 at 1:43 pm
  
  Hi Nancy, Thanks for stopping by; I really appreciate it. So coincidental…ahah, I guess there are a lot of us all over the world. So nice to “meet” you and hopefully I can get involved with the europeanstreetteam a bit more!