W Binding
Materials:
- Piece of light card or heavy paper 15 x 50 cm
- 24 A5 sheets of cartridge or other paper
- 2m thread
- 2 pieces of 2.5 – 3 mm box board 15.5 x 10.5 cm
- Paper to cover and line the card
Method:
- Cut three strips 150 x 2 cm from the light card and set them aside.
- Fold the card in half, and then in quarters, and then eighths then finally sixteenths and concertina, this will be the spine of your book.
- Make 8 sections of three sheets each.
- Take a strip of paper or light card the height of your pages, fold it in half lengthways and mark four holes each 3 cm apart down the centre write TOP at the top. This is your template.
- Lay each section in the fold of an old phonebook and place the template inside use an awl to make 4 holes in each section.
- Repeat for the valley folds of the spine piece.
- Take 1m thread and pull it through some beeswax.
- Place the first section in the first valley fold of the concertina start on the inside in the second hole.
- Go out the 2nd hole in the 3rd out the 4th in the third out the second and in the first then tie off.
- Repeat for all the sections replenishing the thread as required.
- Thread the three pieces of light card through the stitches on the spine.
- Cut two pieces of box board 15.5 x 10.5 cm
- Glue the card and paste on cover paper, trim to 2cm all around.
- Take a spare piece of card and hold it against the corners at 45 degrees, make a pencil mark and trim (this allows for the thickness of the card and gives a nice finish to the corners).
- Finish off the cover with a lining piece which can be either the paper from the book, the paper used on the cover or a contrasting piece.
- Glue the tabs from either end of the concertina to the inside of the covers and glue the ends of the tabs to the outside of the cover and press.
© 2021 Gail Stiffe
papergail.stiffe@gmail.com