Throughout Dear Uncle Eddy, my intention was to make a lay flat hardback book. Little did I know that this would be easier said than done.
After multiple iterations of sequences and design changes , the project became less about the work itself and more about fabrication. I never would have guessed that so much work went into hand making a book and I definitely won't question the price when wondering around village books again.
First of all, because I wanted the book to lay flat, I had to figure out how to make signatures, I learnt that these had to be in multiples of four but could each be different sizes. Having 96 pages, I made the first and last signatures 4 pages each and then the remaining 7 inside signatures weighed 8 pages each. Here I achieved my initial aim and this was the easiest stage in the whole process.
Then I had to learn how to stitch, many cringe-y YouTube tutorials later and I had produced a very loose and crooked kettle stitch that just about held my pages together. The first mistake I would make was joining every signature to the first one rather than just to the previous one, but they worked (just about). After around 20 attempts at the stitch I had finally perfected it, I realised that each hole I punched in the signatures had to be perfectly aligned so that they would each sit flushed to one another.
Next was figuring out how to fashion the signatures together in order for them to be secure when sitting along the spine of the hardback. Attempting to use PVA glue along the spine was something I wanted to avoid, I had seen plenty of people online use this method and not have the text block (the sewn pages) tight enough within the book press- meaning that the glue would seep through and stick the pages together rather than just securing the spine. So I decided to use a thermal binding machine, here I placed my text block into the machine and it would clamp the book tightly before I inserted a fabric strip where the tape would be heated and secured to the spine. This process took around 5 minutes and saved so much time! If I had been using PVA I would have had to wait for the glue to dry overnight to receive the same outcome.
After securing the spine of the text block, I then made the hardback. Again this was another part of the process that was easier said than done. For the front cover design I wanted the image to be tipped into the fabric (this is where the image is debossed so it sits within the fabric) so I used a craft knife to cut a small section out of the mount board. Working out where to cut this was a challenge, for the image to be in the middle of the entire front cover, the cut out on the mount board had to be off centre. This is because when making the hardback case, I had to leave a 1.2mm gap so that a hinge was created where the book could open and lay flat, I therefore had to take this into consideration when cutting. As someone who really struggles with maths, this tested my patience and after a great deal of moral support from my peers (and plenty of failed attempts) I finally cut out the indent.
Next came to attach the book cloth to the mountboard. This step followed the theme of difficulty in the book making process and was the penultimate stage of reaching the final product. It is almost humorous to note that in each stage of the book making process, If one miniscule step goes wrong then it has a detrimental effect on the final outcome, each step has to be perfect otherwise it will be glaringly obvious. So to get to this point and for the text block to be pretty much perfect I was more than happy. Now came to mounting the fabric- to ensure that there was enough fabric to cover the edges of the mountboard I made a template. I would place the front mountboard, then leave the 1.2mm for the spine, then place the spine, leave another 1.2mm gap and then would place the final back mountboard. After this I would draw an inch wide boarder around what I had placed before cutting and gluing down the mountboard to the fabric. I found that the hardest step was to attempt to neatly secure the corners of the fabric. In the end I don't think that they are to a professional standard but they look tidy.
Then came attaching the end papers. To do this, I glued a section of the fabric tape and stuck down the paper, it was important to not glue the whole page down as the page underneath still needed to be visible. Using endpapers rather than sticking down a sewn signature takes the pressure off the text block when the book is being opened and closed. It aids the hinge of the hardback meaning that the book can withhold its integrity.
After this was attaching end bands. These add a decorative touch to the book, because I used red and white ones they stand out whilst accompanying the repetition of the colour pallet with in the sequence of the text block. I cut and attached them to the spine of the text block using adhesive glue, this was to make sure that they dried fast and didn't shift, they needed to lay perpendicular to the spine in order for them to look neat.
The final stage of making a hardback book is to fashion together the text block and the hardback case via the endpapers. I was initially worried about doing this because my previous attempts had failed miserably. Sometimes they would come out wonky, other times wrinkled and sometimes they would bow the inside pages and this looked extremely un professional. This final outcome had to be perfect because of the time and effort that I had already put into the process.
I tentatively glued the end papers down to the hardback and then placed acetate in between the pages underneath this to ensure that the glue didn't seep through and bow the inside pages. I left the book inside the book press over the weekend and come Monday morning I was pleased that the final book was finished!