So tonight is my 3rd session of my Oxford Brookes evening class on Bookbinding. I missed the first session last week due to me being at Shepherds London City & Guild course. So having two days off I decided to try a 1600's bind done with more modern materials. Mostly to see if I could do, but also because I don't have the traditional materials on hand.
I learned how to make this style of bind last year when I took a weekend workshop at Green's Books. You can see the original pictures HERE. Now I had to do some of the steps differently. I've been suffering with some chronic pain in my right shoulder for the last two weeks so using my plough was right out. So I used my stack cutter to trim the edges and with the chords the book block ended up not being so square. I'm pretty sure I know how to do it better next time. Instead of using oak boards or pulp boards I had my friend Tom from Wargame-Model-Mods laser cut me 6 A5 boards with the holes for the chords already cut out for me. Now MDF probably isn't best suited for book boards as I'm guessing they probably have a higher acidic content then grey board or other options but this was more fun so I went with it.
I learned how to make this style of bind last year when I took a weekend workshop at Green's Books. You can see the original pictures HERE. Now I had to do some of the steps differently. I've been suffering with some chronic pain in my right shoulder for the last two weeks so using my plough was right out. So I used my stack cutter to trim the edges and with the chords the book block ended up not being so square. I'm pretty sure I know how to do it better next time. Instead of using oak boards or pulp boards I had my friend Tom from Wargame-Model-Mods laser cut me 6 A5 boards with the holes for the chords already cut out for me. Now MDF probably isn't best suited for book boards as I'm guessing they probably have a higher acidic content then grey board or other options but this was more fun so I went with it.
Instead of using leather I just used my 6mm linen tapes and twisted them
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| double checking everything lines up |
I sanded down the spine end of the boards and using a knife I made a slight hollow for the tapes to fit into to reduce the swell on the cover.
Buckram doesn't stretch like leather so getting the cloth on while the bookblock was attached was a bit tricky. I cut the book cloth with three centimeter turn in but one corner ended up being slightly short. I may have misaligned the covers when I placed them on the cloth as the other three corners came out just fine. I may add a few millimeters on the next one. Fitting the end papers was slightly different as well and I'll have to take a bit more care with the next one to get them squared. Mostly this was just a test run, I enjoyed the process and I got to use some of the stuff I learned at the course in Wiltshire. Next up I have three book blocks sewn and waiting for a case. I need to design something so they look nice. Which is easier to do at a class as they have a better selection of materials than I do!
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