Finally at a decent point to share my 5 volume bind of the Cadence of Part-time Poets by motswolo! Wanted to make letters easily accessible since I think abt Tonya’s letter to Remus an unhealthy amount. Decided to make a box to hold everything and based it off the box of Remus’s mother’s records… it’s a bit janky in some ways but we’ll pretend that’s intentional and authentic🫣

California Renegade meet-up

If ever you're given the chance to meet fellow bookbinders in person, do it. Don't hesitate. The experience of sitting amid a group of individuals who are as wholly obsessed about a hobby as you are was, frankly, fucking awesome.

I'm still floating on a happy cloud of endorphins from this weekend's @renegadeguild Cali server meet-up. It was a small melting pot of fandoms and ships, age ranges and skill levels, and an established ethos about sharing knowledge without reserve or judgment. 

Even with the (very) early morning alarm, a long drive, and nerves about meeting everyone for the first time, it was the best experience. I learned how to marble paper and book edges. I tried my hand at paste papers. I held other binders' books (!!!!) and was properly gobsmacked by their skill, listening as they openly shared how they achieved an edge, an endband, a leather cover, a difficult technique. 

At one point, when the day was winding down and just a few of us were left standing inside @duran-binding's kitchen, a passionate discussion ensued about the history and origins of a fandom I'd never heard of. And in that moment, my mind took a snapshot from above: the five of us animatedly discussing fanfiction and how our favorite fandoms could potentially intersect. It left me feeling intensely grateful for being invited into this community of fanfiction binders.

So yeah. 10/10 recommend. 

Marbling parties are the best ❤️

Fanbinding: Merlin Ambrosius, King of Carthis by @clotpolesonly for Pia (Renegade Bindery Bound Fic Exchange 2024)

This was my actual first attempt at edge painting. Attempt 1 was to do gold foil with a hair dryer, which worked on my tests on thicker paper, but absolutely did not work here. I think I sanded it off like three times, after gluing all the pages together by accident at least once. I ended up resorting to acrylic paint, with a layer of acrylic ink over it for extra shiny.

Title page was mostly done by the heat foil head for the cricut, but for some reason it didn't do the last couple letters, so I stole a foil quill from a friend and traced them. The cover is also a foil quill: I made the design on Illustrator based on a pattern I found, and then printed and traced it.

The story with the endpaper is that I got it in 2012 at Hollanders (in person, moment of silence.) I loved it enough that I have not used it in the, uh, 11 intervening years. I finally decided that this had gone on a ridiculous amount of time, and also, it looked great with the cover. Problem: that paper really wasn't intended to be pressed against itself. It got itself extremely stuck every time the text block was in the press, and I had to very carefully pry it apart with a bone folder. (Eventually I remembered to start putting blank pages in between.)

The cover is moire, with a very cool sort of wavy pattern that doesn't quite come through in these photos. It's incredibly trippy to work with though because it throws off my depth perception:

As I'm preparing Binderary, I've contacted authors of my favourite fanfics to make sure they didn't mind me adding their stories to my bookshelf, posting photos And, if they're interested, to send them a copy (if funds allow; being on the verge of becoming a redundancy does put a question mark to it. It's still something I very much want to make a part of my ethics.)

I tried to build a script for when I contact said authors (and maybe you noticed already, if I've contacted you): a comment in which I desperately try to explain my approach and show I'm a reliable and passionate fanbinder. I swear I'm a writer, but I cringe every time I try to put words on this. I have this huge feeling of illegitimacy, of someone who needs to apologise before I even started the process of binding. I feel like I have to justify everything, in a "don't be afraid, this is a nice project I swear, look here are a billion references that make my message all the more overwhelming" kind of way. I also feel like I'm getting everyone's hopes up, because so many fanbinded books I've seen are gorgeous, while mine are terrible. There's glue everywhere; the pages are printed sideways; the ink bled; the hinges and squares are uneven. Everything is a "prototype" because I don't dare call it a book.

I am immensely grateful for the kindness of the authors I contacted, who were all so accepting, encouraging, and even enthusiastic (although this last one makes me nervous, because as mentioned above: expectations, oh no.)

Now that I have completed some personal projects, I know from experience that photos should not always be trusted, that gorgeous projects have their flaws too, and as such, that mine have a right to be wonky and uneven.

An example: the very first notebook I binded.

I took an old notebook I didn't like the cover of, destroyed it, re-sewed the signatures, added these "Flower Power" pages from a decorated pad I bought for something else completely, and then fought for my life against glue and the paper I picked for the cover.

It does not look awful, if you see the photo from afar. I know multiple people around me said it was nice.

The truth of it:

My cover tore, and I had to add a ribbon to vaguely hide it. Except I didn't have a ribbon that fit. So I added a torn ribbon over a torn cover, adding glue everywhere.

It's even worse on the other side, where you also see that my book case is completely crooked and the squares are so uneven it's almost funny. There's one centimeter of difference here.

As the case would not stick, I added glue and ended up wrapping the endpages INSIDE the cover, rather than glueing them above. The paper tore. Beginner's mistakes.

But hey, the glue makes it shiny, and wrapping looks like I wrapped a present! How fancy.

And yet, when you don't know about it, with the right light and the right untrained eye, it actually looks somewhat nice.

I'm not exactly proud of the result of this first attempt, although I'm really proud I managed to complete the first attempt itself. But I didn't learn from these first mistakes, no. I kept making them again and again, so much so that I gave up doing it by myself only and ended up attending a short bookbinding workshop. (Possibly my best decision of 2024.)

Having access to actually good material with a trained teacher definitely helped. The results look better—and yet.

Look, this one I did last year is so pretty:

The paper cover is gorgeous, and so are the endpapers.

And it's a rounded spine, too, so that's quite fancy. I've had so many people compliment it, and yet...

...yeah. Even with my teacher supervising me in the workshop, it seems like squares are not my friends. It's a good half centimeter here, which on such a small format of notebook actually makes a noticeable difference—that no one notices when they stick to the first photos, the ones that made people go "oooh" and "aaah" and received compliments.

Bottom line: I am an amateur, I am legitimate and not inaccurate as such, and I need to stop feeling shy about sharing my bookbinding photos here. (I do need to learn to take photos, though.)

I've been binding more and more notebooks lately, and made "prototypes", and learnt a lot. And now, I have received the approval of many writers who are eager to see their stories turned into physical books (and I'm eager too) so I know I can proceed with my experiments. Maybe they even won't feel (too) robbed when they see the result.

I'm still looking for a nice/funny/fitting name for my press. Once I have it, I'll likely do a separate blog specifically for my experiments and actual bindings. I am hopeful that having a blog serving as a portfolio will help in feeling more legitimate when I end up contacting more creators, because there are TONS of stories I want on my bookshelves. I've been trying to handmake books since I was five (there was a lot of adhesive tape involved back then), experimenting a lot along the way, until over 25 years later when I stumbled upon Renegade Bindery and reached the "anyone can make books!" mindset.

A few years later, let's be real: NOT anyone can make books. Why is this hobby so expensive in money, time, energy and room? My apartment is small, my bank account will likely not enjoy the job redundancy, and god knows my time and energy were already quite spare before this.

But I proved myself that I can make books, and people don't seem to hate it? And maybe I can give back to authors who spent hours and hours and hours writing story that kept me going through all these years. Even if my squares are uneven, my pages are cut sideways and my my glue stains are impossible to hide.

So here we are. This was my first post about bookbinding, and most of all fanbinding. Now, onto finding a nice name for my press, before I can finally share photos of my lovely mess.

Book Decoration: AKA All The Ways I Don't Use a Cricut

(this post is for people who don't want to buy an expensive cutting tool, or for those that do have an expensive cutting tool that would like to mix things up a little)

1. Print That Shit

If you're already printing your own textblocks, an easy step for titles is to print them. Above is a title printed onto an "obi" of decorative paper. I measured out where I wanted things on the finished book and laid it out in Affinity, then printed it on a full sheet & trimmed it down to wrap around the book. A more simple method is to print & glue on the label into a slight indent in the cover (to protect it). A third option is to do the spine in bookcloth, while you print on paper for the cover and then glue that paper onto the boards (this usually looks even better when it is a three-piece bradel bind).

2. Foil Quill / Heat Pens

The heat pen is one of my go-to tools, but it can be a bit touchy about materials. The most popular version is the We R Memory Keepers' Foil Quill (which is one of the most ergonomic), but other pens exist that can get you to a higher heat temp, finer lines, or more consistent foil. For example, I have a pen created by a local Japanese bookbinding studio that fares way better on leathers than the WRMK quill & with a finer tip, but it's hell to control. Best results in general are on paper or smooth bookcloth (starched linen, arrestox, colibri - even duo will work but its less solid). The fuzzier a bookcloth is, the less your foil quill wants to deal with it. This means the heat n bond method of making bookcloth does not play nice with a heat pen usually, but there are two solutions: 1) use this tutorial on paste + acrylic medium coated bookcloth instead that will get you a perfect surface for the heat pen, or 2) use the pen on paper & then glue onto the cloth. I did a video tutorial for both foil quill use and this type of homemade bookcloth for @renegadeguild Binderary in 2023.

You get the most consistent results by tracing through a printed template that is taped in place, as I do in the video above.

3. Paint That Shit

Acrylic paints will do you fine! The above is free-handed with a circle template, because I wanted that vibe. If you need straight lines that won't seep, lay them down with tape first & then paint over it first with a clear Acrylic medium, then your color. Same goes for stencils. Two more examples of painted bookcloth:

4. IT'S GOT LAYERS

By using layers of thinner boards, you can create interesting depths & contrasts on your cover. You can also make cutouts that peep through to the decorative paper behind. The most important part to this technique is the order in which each edge is wrapped. To get a good wrapped inside edge, you will split the turn in into tabs to get them to conform to a curve. You can also layer multiple colors of bookcloth without multiple layers of board, as seen below left, so long as you mind your cut edges for fraying.

5. Inlaid... anything

Mirrors! Marbled paper! I saw someone do a pretty metal bookmark once! The key is creating a little home for it to live in, which is pretty similar to the above layering method. On one layer you cut the shape, & glue that layer onto the bottom solid board before covering. You can do the top layer as an entire 1 mm board (like I did for the mirrors) or a sheet of cardstock, like I would use for inlaid paper.

6. Decorative Paper

Decorative paper is always helpful & adds to the paper hoard... & its effects can be layers with other techniques, as below. Marbles, chiyogami, momi, or prints & maps of all kinds can be great additions. Some papers may need a protective coating (such as wax or a sealer).

7. Stamps (with optional linocut)

While I've not used many more regular rubber stamps, I do know some who have, successfully! And I've used one once or twice with embossing powder (see photo 3 up, the gold anchor on the little pamphlet bind). What also works is to carve your own linocut or stamp, & then use block printing ink to ink it onto your fabric (as i did above). A bit time intensive, but it was nice how easily reproducible it was, and I liked the effect I got for this particular bind.

These methods are not exhaustive, just ones I've used, and there are of course many others. I haven't gone too into detail on any of these for the sake of length (& post photo limits) but feel free to ask about more specifics. Usually I'm using them in combination with other options.

The 2024 Annual Endband Review!

A selection of 9 endbands sewed in the last year (there's a couple not pictured).

The big change this year: every endband sewn this year was done in 100% silk thread, which has a gorgeous shine to it.

Plus, breaking my own statement about not wanting to sew endbands on flat-backed books.

Goal for next year: try out a new endband style.

*throws some patterns in your face* These will all be lanyards and probably gold foil washi tape as well. Pattern inspiration from top to bottom: Ukrainian egg dying, Chinese blue porcelain, Japanese kimono motifs, the locked tomb, Norwegian rosemaling

The finished typeset > the print > the full system crash

New fanbinding project is going really well!

"The Other Mountain" by nirejseki

I was thrilled to be able to bind this Wen Ruohan/Lan Qiren fic for @robininthelabyrinth. As you can see I stuck with Wen colors for the bind--Lan Qiren marries into the Wen sect, after all. I found this lovely red chiyogami paper that had a bit of a stylized cloud pattern going on and thought it would be perfect for the endpapers, and a bit of the cover decoration as well (it's also lining the inside of the slipcase). I carried that style of stylized cloud into the outside of the slipcase, and tried to echo it in the horizontal lines on the title page and chapter headers too.

Fonts used: Solvieg (titles) and Sorts Mill Goudy (text)

Here is the Arts & Crafts version, entirely handcrafted, of my art book Forgotten Gods.

We printed it with @psycheophiuchus , using our own presses on Vélin d'Arches paper. Each design in the book was then screen-printed by hand with gold and colored inks, with up to five different screen-printing passes depending on the complexity of the pages.

Once the sheets were folded and gathered into signatures, Sophie Charlot, a Meilleur Ouvrier de France, meticulously bound them by hand. Belfea Archerie created all the leather parts and applied the dyes. Together, we assembled the covers on the book bodies bound by Sophie, and I gilded the cover with gold leaf (using three different shades of 22-23k gold).

Finally, I made the wooden cases and covered them with fabric. We then attached the clasp and the repoussé leather medallion, dyed by Belfea and gilded by me.

All the illustrations were printed using our presses; they are fine art prints on velvet-finish paper. With Psyché, we enhanced about thirty of them with gold (using several shades of 22-23k gold) to match the appearance of the original artworks. These illustrations were then hand-glued and protected with tracing paper, also hand-glued by Psyché and me.

King of Gods has represented a significant part of my work in recent years. It has been a passionate and enriching adventure, in the true spirit of the Arts & Crafts movement and in the footsteps of the Kelmscott Press. Thank you to everyone who worked on this book.

"Wen Xiao had supplied a surprising range of documentation. Some of it was rather florid poetry with a lot of barely comprehensible metaphors. Some of it was anatomical illustrations. Some manuscripts purported to be accurate historical accounts, and several were straight-up pornography with no pretence to literary style."

a fanARTifact book based on this brilliant fic by @achray1

My first fanARTifact in a cdrama fandom and I'm in love with it. It came together far easier than most of my projects do. As always, see pics and read more below.

Fanbinding: an injury to one (and other stories) by @deniigi

PACKAGE FOR DENIIGIQ IS IN THE MAIL (though they've seen photos) SO I CAN YELL A LITTLE ABOUT THIS ONE!!

I took a linocut class back in May and I was immediately in love and determined to incorporate this into my bookbinding. I had a fic in mind almost immediately. "an injury to one" and its jedi-clone unionizing was the perfect choice for a more gritty linocut of a union-inspired symbol, complete with crossed lightsaber hilt & DC blaster buttstock. I printed it for both the title page and the cover fabric.

you may also reconize this asymmetrical silk endband from my recent post about making endbands! I picked colors for this fic based on the colors for the Coruscant Guard & also a nice gold for some Mandalorian vengeance.

which then match the endpapers (some more excellent crepaldi):

I also had a ton of fun with the typesetting for this fic, since I was including the companion fics as well. Some spreads:

sorry... there are too many photos for this one they have to go in the reblog...

more photos of typeset layouts! and fic propaganda!

plus, the two volumes together and the linocut:

a closer shot of the print on fabric:

thank you @deniigi for the chance to bind your works!

I've been working on binding my latest JonGerry fic that I wrote for this years Rusty Quill Big Bang into a book, and I'm so happy with the result!

First time rounding a book, which was a lot easier than expected, and my first cutout cover, which was exactly as fiddly as I thought it would be with the image I chose 😆 definitely worth it though!

My b/w laser printer did not handle the art very well, unfortunately. I need to think on a solution for occasional colour prints.