A bunch of people have asked me over time how to use their own fabric for book covers. In other words, they want to know how to turn their own fabric into book cloth.

The bottom line is, you need to back you fabric with some form of paper. Japanese tissue paper (kozo) is tough yet flexible so it's a great choice.

As for the adhesive between the fabric and backing paper, wheat/rice should be used. Paste is better because it dries transparent and it does not set instantly so it will you give time to maneuver. You'll also need some form of big brush (bamboo brush is great) or rubber roller to get rid of the bubbles.

The following video explains the gist of paper-backing a piece of fabric. The use of a scraper to spread the paste is just, I think, amazing.

Paper-backing silk for binding books

However, here are a few things that I'd do it differently:
1. I'd not apply glue to the fabric, it's just easier not to.
2. I'd mount the fabric-paper combo onto a clean vertical glass surface, and smooth it with a big bamboo brush. It's more economical.
3. I'd put a piece of scrap paper between the glass surface and the bookcloth so that I can lift the bookcloth up easily.

If you have a great clip shot on your digital camera/camcorder, or even on your camera phone, would you like to create a flip book for it?

Designer and animator Bennett Hazlip has created an After Effects template so that he could easily export a clip into a sequence of JPEGs for printing. Once printed and cropped, and, of course, binded, your clip will become an impressive flip book!

Technology working hand-in-hand with bookbinding!

Via Craftzine.

Among the books that I've created during the last 5 years, there are a bunch of them that I truly love. Their forms and elements have become staple items in my repertoire. I tend to reuse and recreate them in various pieces thereafter. I recently took a look back at the work that I have created in the last 5 years and picked 9 of my favorites.

From left to right:
Row 1: Exposed Long Stitch (2005), Book 79 (2007), White dots (2006)
Row 2: Thick Long-stitch (2007), Buttonhole Rainbow (2007), Simple Coptics (2005)
Row 3: Red Coptic with Quarter Cloth (2005), Yellow Ribbon (2004), Black Plum (2007)

They all happen to be non-adhesive bindings, and almost all of them have exposed threads. That also says a lot about what I love most in handmade books: you can see how the pages are put together.

Thanks to reader Cathy, who mentioned to me that the RSS feeds were seemingly broken. Again, thanks to all my supportive readers (like you) whom I mostly cherish and keep this site up for! Thank you again!

Another Dorothea Rockburne's piece can be found in another concurrect exhibition at the MoMA. Pictures don't do justice to Locus; as if you look closely, you will see that the ink gives the various surfaces of the folded paper differnet shins.

Another interesting piece I saw at the "Multiplex: Directions in Art, 1970 to Now" exhibit was Tobias Putrih's cardboard sculpture, Macula Series A&L.


I have seen other cardboard sculptures before, but Putrih's work has a unique organic shape which is rather refreshing.

Also, if you look at the sculptures from a distance, you can see through the hollow "tubes" between the cardboard pieces as light would go through them. It creates a very interesting visual effect.

I took a stroll at MoMA a few days ago, and saw some pieces that I thought would be interesting because they are related to books/paper.


Dorothea Rockburne's A, C and D From Group/And (1970) is a set of 3 rolls of paper, which are held onto the top of the wall by nails, and are released down freely. The end of each sheet is held onto the wall by pieces of boards on top of them. Its big scale is rather breath-taking. You'd look up and see the long sheets of paper being held onto the wall flat.

I saw and bought a pad of Echizen washi paper (越前和紙) at Pearl River over the weekend, which I thought would be great for origami.

The town Imadate (今立町) in Fukui province (福井縣), Japan has been home to Echizen washi for years. There are at least 80 paper-related family factories in the valley. The Fukui area was used to be called Echizen country therefore the washi produced there is called Echizen washi. Echizen washi is considered to be the mother of all washi in Japan. It has at least 1,500 years of history.



Washi is mulberry paper. This page has a great photo essay on Echizen washi production.