Crooked Branch Bindery

I am a hobbiest bookbinder based in TX, USA. This blog is one part portfolio, one part journal, where I document my projects as I learn.

[crookedbranchbooks]

His Majesty's Dragon - Naomi Novik

July 6, 2025

Full cloth case binding with design in heat transfer vinyl.

Recover of the del rey paperback edition.

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board spine stiffener - paperboard covering material - navy blue suede bookcloth vinyl - cricut silver foil HTV

endpapers - [] endbands - suede bookcloth rolled over twine edge painting - silver and navy blue acrylic paint

Cover Design: Designed in Photopea. Fonts are Aquiline Two (title) and Balthazar (author). Ship and dragon vectors from the noun project. Took some inspiration from this fourth wing design.

dimensions: 4.125"x7.125"x1" Old cover:

Original sketch:

Earlier drafts of the back design:

[crookedbranchbooks]

Do you have any resources for learning to bind books that you'd recommend?

These are the resources I used when first starting, which are pretty beginner friendly and mainly use software and craft supplies you're probably already familiar with or could get for fairly cheap:

ArmoredSuperHeavy's guide, a google doc ref mainly focused on typesetting in word

in depth beginner tutorial by ally- the little key, a youtube guide focused on the actual binding process

More general resources:

DAS bookbinding is a youtube channel with information on basically everything bookbinding under the sun, would trust him with my life

this tool will do the imposition (laying out the pages to be printed in folios) for you if you upload a pdf

the renegade discord server is full of people who'd love to offer more help, advice, and cheerleading, and it's been an invaluable resource for me for having questions answered, crowdsourcing design ideas, and getting inspired by everyone else's great work

[crookedbranchbooks]

Amber Skies by @cryptotheism

June 12, 2025

Full cloth case binding with paper overlay and design in heat transfer vinyl.

I followed Amber Skies when it was being updated weekly, and read the latter half of it live. Even though I hadn't reread it in since, so much of the worldbuilding and the imagery stuck with me. So when I started thinking about internet-published texts to bind, Amber Skies was one of the first things to come to mind. Almost all of the styling of this book stems from me finding the black and white geometric patterned paper in paper source. It defined the "black and white with yellow accents" color scheme, and inspired the maze motif in the title page and chapter headers. The "maze" is meant to evoke the complex, confusing, and often deadly shafts and halls of Teleth Thadeyn, and the front page design is roughly the shape I imagined the megacity to be (although I would not be shocked to learn that I'm off base there, Heaven being at the top of a spire is a fun visual but not structurally sound). The yellow accents on the cover are all in a handwritten/hand-drawn style, meant to contrast against the stark black and white lines, representative of all of the people (and creatures) that have passed through Teleth Thadeyn and made their home their long after the death of the architects. The symbol on the back is the shaft-diver sign for danger, as described by Kali: "an inverted triangle with a cross through it."

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board spine stiffener - paperboard covering material - white linen bookcloth overlay - screenprinted paper with geometric design vinyl - siser easyweed yellow vinyl

endpapers - [] endbands - faux double core french endband, with cotton embroidery floss edge painting - yellow and orange acryllic paint textblock paper - Church bookbinding paper, 20lb, cream, 8.5x11

Typeset: Designed in Scribus. The body font is Libertinus Serif, headings are in SaaSeriesDDOT. Maze images from Adobe Stock.

Cover Design: Designed in Photopea. Font is Permanent Marker.

dimensions: 5.5"x8.5"

[crookedbranchbooks]

Notebooks

June 11, 2025

Three-piece bradel binding with cloth on the spine and paper on the front and back.

Fathers day gifts for my dad and stepdad.

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board spine stiffener - paperboard spine covering material - suede bookcloth in blue and green front and back covering material - [] vinyl - siser easyweed white vinyl

endpapers - bronze and blue cardstock with pearl finish endbands - paper rolled over twine bookmarks - 1/8" gold ribbon textblock paper - 20lb printer paper, bright white, 8.5x14

Typeset: Individual page layouts were made in Microsoft Word, thoroughly abusing the table function beyond its intention, then converted into PNGs and combined in Scribus. The font is Coelocanth.

dimensions: 4.25"x7"

[crookedbranchbooks]

Notebook

May 25, 2025

Coptic binding with spine details.

This image was shared in the Renegade Guild's discord server, but nobody could find the original creator, and several people began speculating as to how it was done. The idea wouldn't leave my head, so I tried to recreate it. I simplified the design somewhat, as this was only my second attempt at coptic binding.

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board covering material - [] thread - cotton embroidery floss textblock paper - 20lb printer paper, bright white, 8.5x14

dimensions: 4.25"x7"

[crookedbranchbooks]

Personal Planner

May 24, 2025

Full cloth case binding, faux leather, with hot foiled designs.

This is a notebook/planner that I made for myself, to suit my own needs and preferences in a planner. Each week has a 2-page planner spread, followed by 2 pages of lined notebook paper. Every six-week increment has a habit tracker page. There are two bookmarks, because I find that very useful for notebooks (and books with lots of appendices). This was my first time using faux leather, and my first time hotfoiling. The cover is a reference to At the Feet of the Sun by Victoria Goddard, in which a character has an extra volume bound to match his law books to be used for secret notes. You can tell that this was the point I realized I prefer a 1/8" square!

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board spine stiffener - paperboard, with another layer of paperboard to provide 3d details covering material - maroon leathercloth foil - hot foil applied with quill

endpapers - [] endbands - paper rolled over twine bookmarks - 1/8" gold ribbon textblock paper - 20lb printer paper, bright white, 8.5x14 Typeset: Individual page layouts were made in Microsoft Word, thoroughly abusing the table function beyond its intention, then exported as PDFs and combined using Adobe's in-browser PDF editing tools. The font is Tara. Cover Design: Designed in Photopea, then printed and traced with a foil quill. The font is Alegreya SC, the sun and border motifs are from openclipart.

dimensions: 4.25"x7"

[crookedbranchbooks]

Notebooks

May 5, 2025

Three-piece bradel binding with cloth on the spine and paper on the front and back.

Notebook typeset by CanardRoublard.

These are a set of books I made in the same style in the same week, as gifts for my mother and a friend. They were the first notebooks I ever made, as simple quick-and-easy gifts.

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board spine stiffener - paperboard spine covering material - linen bookcloth in white and red front and back covering material - paper constellation gift back cut up and repurposed, floral wrapping paper vinyl - cricut brand gold foil

endpapers - pale yellow cardstock, royal blue cardstock with pearl finish endbands - paper rolled over twine bookmarks - 1/8" gold ribbon textblock paper - 20lb printer paper, bright white, 8.5x11 notebook typeset used with permission by creator

dimensions: 5.5"x8.5"

[crookedbranchbooks]

Neuromancer - William Gibson

April 18, 2025

Woven cloth case binding, three-piece bradel.

Recover of the penguin paperback edition.

While driving home from the art museum, I was struck by the idea of weaving two different bookcloth together to cover a book. The idea consumed me and I finished this in 6 hours. Basically every other decision followed from the decision to weave bookcloth. I already had two different types of black bookcloth available, and chose to use those together. This inspired the idea to make a completely monochromatic book, where all visual interest came from differences in texture. The bookcloth is black, the endpapers are black, the edges are painted black, the title on the spine is black vinyl. The book is a three-piece bradel because the idea of covering the entire case in woven strips at once was too daunting.

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board spine stiffener - paperboard covering material - linen bookcloth in black, suede bookcloth in black vinyl - siser easyweed vinyl in black

endpapers - black cardstock endbands - linen bookcloth rolled over twine edge painting - black acryllic paint

[crookedbranchbooks]

The Remembrance of Earth's Past - Cixin Liu

April 14, 2025

Full cloth case binding with design in heat transfer vinyl.

These books consumed me for the two weeks I spent working on them. Every day I would get home from work and open photoshop to work on the cover designs for hours each day. Once I had a strong vision in mind of the color scheme and concentric circles motif, I couldn't stop. The front and back covers of each book depict some of the most iconic moments and imagery from the series, but in an abstract enough way to not act as spoilers (I hope). The quotes on the back were chosen to best represent the themes of each book. I'm particularly proud of the pyramid on the spines.

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board spine stiffener - paperboard covering material - linen bookcloth in black, white, and red vinyl - siser easyweed vinyl in black, white, and red

endpapers - [] endbands - linen bookcloth rolled over twine bookmarks - 1/4" satin ribbon edge painting - black, white, and red acryllic paint

Cover Design: Designed in Photopea. English font is Poppins Extrabold, Chinese font is Droid Sans. My original sketch:

Potential ideas for the back of the three body problem:

Digital mockups:

[crookedbranchbooks]

I, Robot - Isaac Asimov

April 5, 2025

Full cloth case binding with design in white and silver vinyl.

Recover of the Del Rey trade paperback edition.

Cover design copied from the Harper Voyager hardcover edition.

This binding was just an "experiment" in many ways. It was my first time recasing a paperback, and my first time working with two different layers of vinyl, a test-run of new techniques to prepare for more ambitious projects. As it was just an experiment, I didn't spend time on creating my own cover design, and instead tried to recreate an existing design.

Materials: covers - 2 mm grey board spine stiffener - paperboard covering material - black suede bookcloth vinyl - cricut brand silver foil, siser easyweed white vinyl

endpapers - green cardstock, pearl finish endbands - black suede bookcloth rolled over twine