My Wildflower Books

[Noihvo]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[LizEF]

That's a gorgeous book, Noihvo! I particularly like the angled corners and the pattern on the paper - especially the bird on the back. You should definitely keep doing this.

[dennis_f]

That is wonderful work Noivho; incredibly refined, meticulous, and elegant. I can't wait to see more of your work.

[Tasmith]

Beautiful!

[Karmachanic]

First class workmanship! Dimensions? Page count? Lies flat?

I tend to go for more conservative accoutrement, but that can easily be accomplished.

Looking forward to seeing more of your carefully, handmade work.

Edited January 13, 2019 by Karmachanic

[Noihvo]

[Noihvo]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Noihvo]

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Noihvo]

 

 

 

 

 

[amberleadavis]

WOW WOW WOW

I'm very impressed.

 

BTW, I still love that Twiss.

[Noihvo]

 

 

 

 

 

[PaulS]

if I could spell the word psychadelic I think this last volume would definitely qualify - as an occasional binder I can appreciate your words - therapeutic and time flies when you're engrossed in this work. With these corners the style is half library - without, it becomes quarter library. Am intrigued with your book where the red corners are pre-cut (at the corner of the book) ready for turning in - never tried that - does it really make for easier turning in?

I think the volume with the montage of real flower pix is my favourite - so, my order for next Christmas is two of each please

[BergerDM]

Love your work! You're the second artisanal bookbinder I've seen use 320 pages as their go-to. Is there a particular reason behind this?

 

Thanks!

[txomsy]

Great work. Thanks for sharing and inspiring.

[amberleadavis]

That is AWESOME!!!!

[PaulS]

I can't think off-hand of a particular reason for 320 pages - though could be some hidden meaning that eludes me. Book binding is not an everyday hobby, and I'd suggest most folk here won't know what's involved in order to arrive at such attractively finished volumes ………… glue that causes paper or board to bow the wrong way, and having to remember to make sure the grain of paper and board runs head to tail etc. are just a couple of the gremlins that can ruin work. It's good to see that when finished, the book does opens fully on the table - many of mine refuse to oblige, but then that's one of the down sides of rounding and backing the spine. Coptic sewing is another binding method that allows the book to lay open very easily to 180 degrees, since there's a complete absence of adhesive in the spine and the link stitching, without tapes, remains exposed.

 

I'd agree that leaving out the sewing supports - the tapes - can be useful ………….. they often create too much unevenness in the spine, and the link stitching is attractive and strong. Your books look to be composed of sections - what the States binders call signatures. This is a stronger binding style than, for example, a 'perfect binding' - a modern commercial inexpensive method where the entire book is composed of single sheets held together, at the spine, by a thick layer of rubberized adhesive. Most cheap paperbacks are made this way, and together with paper that's not acid free, they tend not to last long. It's a style that can have some use to an amateur, and occasionally needs to be preserved where many single sheets cannot be sewn in the same way as sections/signatures.

 

Like your corners - they're neat. Can only say that you've learned a lot and accomplished some nice books in the short period you've been binding - you must keep binding.

[txomsy]

Uhm... let's see. I'm not claiming that Nolhvo did following a similar reasoning, but to me it sounds natural.

 

I learned to do book binding in primary school (long ago, when that was likely still considered useful). One started from a leaf sheets paper that was folded. These folded sheets were bound in multiples of four (hence each multiples of 8 pages), typically (as I remember) we would use groups of 8 folded sheets, which would give 16 pages. Usually the maximum fold used to be 4 times.

 

That seemed to be a traditional rule of printers based on a sort of printer origami: if you take a large sheet (say A2 or A3, though we used a different size system then), the easiest way to speed up the process is to fold it: do it twice and cut one border, then you get two folded sheets, giving 4 leaves and 8 pages. Which is too "thin". Fold it again and you start getting something worth sewing, composed of 4 sheets, 8 leaves, 16 pages and that only requires cutting two borders.

 

The beauty of it was that you could fold each large sheet, bind/sew them together, and once finished, simply make the two cuts and get the leaves separated. You can still see this happening in many books where sometimes two pages are totally or partially bound together: this would typically be because after folding, the innermost fold would be, well, inner than the outermost, and if you cut very conservatively, you may fail to cut through all the folds.

 

=========

SPINE

<<<<========

| ^You'd want to cut from here to the innermost part

^But if you cut a bit out, some pages may remain unseparated

 

Which is why I still have a paper cutter/letter opener at hand, and why we were always advised to browse through books before acquiring them to check they were unblemished (other issues might be folded pages or printing issues).

 

That's how you got the standard sizes of folio, quarto, octavo or sextodecimo in bound books (which would correspond loosely to modern A4, A5, A6 and A7)

 

By following the trend and binding quires/sections in multiples of 10, one would naturally arrive to 80, 160 or 320 page books depending one how many groups you sow together. That was also traditional: groups/quires/sections were usually measured in "hands" (not sure the English term), which would be 5 quires (1/20th of a ream).

 

I am sorry if not using proper terminology, I learnt using different size system and country/language-specific terminology and very, very long ago.

Edited May 24, 2019 by txomsy

[PaulS]

should have added to my words last evening .............. my utmost admiration for people here for whom English is not their first tongue - especially when trying to describe some technical method.

 

Pages that remain joined at the head of the book, when purchased from the printer, are described as 'uncut', and in English the word used to describe this join is known as a bolt - so if you wish to read the page then you must cut the bolts (or borders).

 

Picking up a little on txomsy's contribution ............... it's quite correct that well made books consist of sections (signatures in the States) ............… a traditional section consists of four folios ( one folio is a single sheet folded in half, side to side). So - four folded sheets (one section) equals eight leaves, or sixteen pages. This system can vary occasionally, but I'd suggest most books are made following this historical format. However, life is nothing if not unpredictable and there are many books where the sections/signatures consist of less or more that four folios - which may well be the case with the op's work.

In the end of course you can make a book consisting of as many or as few sections as you wish, and the total number of pages will reflect this.

[Noihvo]

 

 

[BergerDM]

Thanks for all your responses to the page number conundrum!

 

I asked about 320 pages because, honestly, I feel it is too much of a step when writing. I can't write without my hand supported, so the bottom of pages (being a lefty underwriter) is where I have the most problems, so notebooks and journals with less pages are ideal for me. I LOVE the looks of most artisanal journals out there, but they are high in page count which makes them unattractive to me as a consumer, which is why I asked; I wanted to know if it was something that had to be done to maintain the structure of the product or if it was a personal choice of the maker.