BOOKS

I make books far more regularly than I actually use them; as a result, I have a number of the things sitting empty around the house. If you let practically stop you though, well, you wouldn't have as many books I guess.

I typically tend to go for an older, weathered appearance, the like you'll never find in a stationary store. A tutorial (when finished) will be below as to how you can make your own books. It's a fairly long but also fairly straightforward process.

If you're interested in bookbinding yourself, I've created a tutorial as a downloadable PDF which can be found here:

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Tutorial

Here's the basic look of one of my books; (artificial) leather for the cover, stuffed with paper, stitched and glued, often repeatedly, until I can be sure nothing's going to fall out.

Here's something more elaborate, stitching around the outside to fasten two matching sides of the cover together, then milliput and gemstones affixed to the front with patterned glue and a button and elastic loop behind for fastening.

This one is green... and shiny. Having the stitching around the spine can give a good rustic effect on occasion I think, though it's a matter of personal preference.

The symbol on the front is 'Onisimith' in sigil form. I intended this to be a hardcopy of narrative poems for traveling purposes.

Increasingly I 'age' the paper I use for books by drenching it in coffee then scrunching it. It adds a good deal more character to the finished product I think, though the sacrifice of coffee can be hard to justify to myself.

For the impatient, a fan heater is a must have.

Have a care if you decide to paint your book's covers, use the wrong stuff and they can wind up unworkably sticky. This unfortunate example quickly became a magnet for dust, fluff and adjacent envelopes.