手取川製本 ~ Tedorigawa Bookmakers

Bookbinding

I cased in two books in the last week. One, The Kenrokuen Souvenir Notebook, is an A6 (pocketbook-size) mostly blank notebook. The recto pages (right side) contain really short Japanese l…

Bookbinding

About two months ago, probably longer, I folded two sets of A5 sheets of paper in order to make two A6 notebooks (blank). Those signatures sat on my workbench for those months,  unfinishe…

Bookbinding

This week in bookbinding, I made an A6-size blank notebook with a relatively unique cover. First, the book is six signatures with four folios each. It’s cal…

Bookbinding

Life

I have told you in the past that I had a relative who had a terminal disease and that I was taking care of her. That relative has died. That relative was my wife. We met when she was 23, and she…

Bookbinding

This week or last, can’t remember, I made a sunny yellow book called Solaris Libri. The original name was the Sun Book, to go along with the Snowbank Book and the Earth Book, but decided …

Bookbinding

I did something I should have done when I first started making books, but was too naive (dumb?) to do. I recommend new bookbinders do this activity. 

I made three A6-sized blank notebooks…

Bookbinding

In the last week, I have made four or five books of varying skill levels. Mostly, I made three books to test out various hinge gap spacing. Some people recommend one size, others another…

Bookbinding

In Episode 306, I showed you a French Link Stitch I made in January of this year. Well, this week I cased it in with book cloth I made last year and chiyogami Japanese endpapers. It’s sti…

Bookbinding

Two things happened last week. First, a family member fell sick. Second, I fell under the spell of norovirus, the stomach bug. Third, the family member physically fell and needed to be ta…

Bookbinding

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been binding quite a bit; not crazily, but more than usual.

I made three A6 (pocketbook)-sized blank notebooks with between 140 and 160 pages. I’ve used ket…

Bookbinding

In January 2025, I made my second attempt at a French link stitch on a 160-page, A6-size blank notebook called, appropriately enough, The 2025 Blank 160-page French Link Stitch Notebook.

Bookbinding

Playing around with DaVinci and Gemini I requested a nun with a smirk on her face in an abandoned village. And got this lady with an uncharacteristic moon hovering above her head, a detai…

Bookbinding

I delved into prefect binding – the binding that uses glue instead of thread to keep the signatures together; the style of binding most common in ordinary store-bought, factory-produced b…

Bookbinding

This week, we have a notebook called Blank Proust. I made it because I wanted to make a blank notebook with an interesting cover. Simultaneously, I’m reading Marcel Proust’s In Search of …

Bookbinding

Today we have two blank red notebooks. Both are A5 (pocketbook) in size, about 100 pages each, and with stylish endpapers. Useful for sketching, scheduling, taking notes, or practicing ra…

Bookbinding

I took a plane flight the other month. As soon as I saw the vomit bag (waterproof disposal bag, according to the airline) I thought: Book Cover! As one does when one makes books. On the s…

Bookbinding

Not much in the way of bookbinding this week, but I have an excuse: heat and laziness on my part. I did, however, purchase several tenugui that I will eventually turn into book covers. Th…

Bookbinding

We (meaning I, i.e. the royal We), made an A6-sized (pocket book) Coptic-bound, blank notebook with seven signatures of four folios for about 112 pages. Pages are numbered for easy refere…

Bookbinding

We finished the renovation of a client’s well-used travel book. It got a new map, a new cover, and new endpapers. The client also requested a blank notebook so I sent two blank notebooks.…