toomuchplor's bookbinding blog

Fanbinding blog for @toomuchplor. I do my best to seek author and artist permission but if you spot anything of yours and you’re not happy about it, lmk and I’ll take it down. All binding for personal use only. Authors and artists whose work I bind, you may ALWAYS request a copy and I will do my best to get one to you within the bounds of time and budget. All fan binds are for personal use only and will never be sold for profit

[plor-bindery]

Bound: Slap Shots

My first fanbind for 2026! And it's March! Agh!

Like so many of you, I've been busy consuming/being consumed by the Heated Rivalry fandom explosion. But now I have something to show for it, other than several fics... a bind!

This bind uses the typeset created by @citrusses and @phoenixortheflame as part of their Slap Shots BTIYS Shinny. This gorgeous typeset features 21 fics from 13 Hollanov authors (including the typesetters themselves, and yours truly). You can find all the fics in the anthology here. Except mine, because I had those permissions turned off, whoops. The two included are here and here.

Cit and Phoenix also gave participants an extremely generous deadline which I missed by... over two weeks? Three? Who's counting!

Anyway, here it is at last!

The big feature here, other than that sweet typeset, is obviously the incredible art of @cloudabserk, who generously gave me permission to use his work. I adore his art, which is delightfully playful and emotional and sweet and funny. In fact, I couldn't make up my mind on what to use, which is why I wound up making a dust jacket to fit in a few more amazing bits.

Features of the bind:

hand-sewn silk French faux double core end bands

speckled edge decoration

handmade (by me!) marbled end papers

printed HTV and plain for the cover decoration

dust jacket printed on glossy photo paper and laminated with 1.5 mil soft-touch laminate

Some shots of the dust jacket because I can't get enough. (In fact, stay tuned for a possible paperback version just because I want more of this design in my life/on my shelves.)

Big thanks to Cit and Phoenix for organizing this! And again, thanks to cloudabserk for letting me pilfer his amazing art.

[plor-bindery]

Bound: Heaven is a bedroom by Charlotte_Stant AKA @thomasmomwell (Hollanov, rated E)

I adore this fic. I devoured it while travelling, and then promptly reread it two more times so I could savour it properly. It's a brilliant mix of comedy and angst, and it serves Mormon missionary Elder Hollander as well as fuckboy Ilya "MIT Grad" Rozanov in a delightful AU.

Did I fuck up the author's pseud punctuation? Yes, I did! Did I realize this at any time until JUST NOW? No, I did not!

However, bless the author for having blanket permission. Sorry for fucking up your pseud.

(Aside: Authors! Have blanket permission! It's so easy and it keeps us from nagging you, AND you get surprise binds popping up like this! I say all this as an author myself, with blanket permission!)

For this bind, I located the official LDS font (Baker Signet, if you care) so I could commit a higher level of sacrilege, using it for all the scriptural quotes and drop caps and such. I had to do a couple of pull quotes because there are just so many good ones, and of course I needed to feature the author's amazing use of *** swear censorship because it somehow stayed funny all the way through the whole fic.

I also created the faux missionary name tag art, as well as the cover design.

I used my own marbled papers for the end papers and end bands. For a minute I thought I'd flown too close to the sun with the narrow little 2mm squares I used, but look! My squares came out so well!

I also had to create a tiny faux-Mormon dust jacket just so I could shamelessly abuse Canva Christian stock art. This one features a very Mormon Jesus, as he's standing in the mountains; he also somehow looks like his parents forgot to pick him up after baseball practice.

The dusty, like Shane, is doing a poor job of pretending to be holy and righteous while actually wanting to get down with Ilya, who is DTF.

Also, yes, I did custom-draw a cross made of dicks. I'm not even sorry about it. The SVG is available to any other binders with blasphemous intentions, just hmu.

Details:

letter quarto bind (so smol!)

short-grain 24# cream paper

2 mm board covered with Verona book cloth in sapphire, decorated using lime green HTV

end papers and end bands are marbled paper by me

spine is rounded but not backed

dust jacket title and the text on the one flap are from an LDS site, which is linked to by the author in the author's notes

dust jacket is printed on photo paper and laminated with soft-touch

with thanks to @phoenixortheflame and @citrusses for lots and lots of feedback and encouragement on the design of the cover and dust jacket

Read this fic! Leave kudos and comments!

All fanbinds by me are for personal use only and will never be sold or profited from.

[plor-bindery]

Bound: Away Childish Things by @letteredlettered

I've wanted to bind this fic since I knew that binding fics was a thing. Do I need to talk about this fic? You all know this fic, right? If you don't, GO READ THIS FIC. Formative Drarry. Beautiful child POV. Heartbreaking and delicious.

This is a bind of a typeset by @phoenixortheflame, featuring stunning art by @the-forbidden-forest. Hat-tip to Phoenix for the font, which I borrowed for the cover design.

This book is bound in Duo, which I picked up in Amsterdam last month even while thinking "how tf am I going to use this bright-ass yellow-orange colour". But I had this decorative paper with orange flowers, and I thought about paper onlay using it, and it all came together somehow! (This is probably the least two-colour Duo colourway I've seen, btw -- I guesss you might argue for a reddish cast when the book is tipped this way and that? But it doesn't do the full colour change I've seen on other Duo binds.)

Other details:

3 mm board case binding covered in Duo

silk double-core endbands on 1 mm and 2 mm round leather cores (I'm still working on that technique obvs)

rounded and backed

decorative end papers from the Paper Place? I think?

spine lined with kraft paper and decorative paper for more support/stiffness, which means there's not a lot of throw up on the spine, which is... nice? Different to other big binds I’ve done anyway

sanded head and tail because my ploughing technique is...not great for that yet

edges decorated with sprinkled acrylic ink that went slightly awry -- another thing I'm still working on

HTV decoration

Decorative paper onlay using a tangram-style design (paper is cut with Cricut for accuracy!)

A little peep at the inside but check out Phoenix's amazing bind for more.

[plor-bindery]

Bound (again): Slap Shots Anthology

Take two of this bind, this time in paperback form! I had to whip up a version in the Raiders colours, of course, so there are two paperbacks here. This features the typeset by the amazing @citrusses and @phoenixortheflame and fics by a raft of Hollanov authors, as part of the BTIYS Shinny organized by Cit and Phoenix. I gifted a copy of this paperback to each of them to thank them for their work!

With thanks again to the incredible @cloudabserk for his artwork used all over the bind. (Cloud, your copy of the hard cover is coming your way soon!)

[plor-bindery]

Bound: i know where to draw the line by @magneticwave

I hope you've read this magnificent AU by magneticwave, but just in case you haven't -- this is a delightful what-if fic that explores a world where Shane was born three years earlier and Ilya, three years later. The result is a (slight) age difference fic that gives us an older, more world-weary Shane falling for a younger, more vulnerable Ilya. It's a pure delight, and the moment I finished reading it, I knew I wanted to bind it.

As you can see, I went pretty simple on this one! I had the vision of something graphical and clean and slightly evocative of an informational pamphlet from the 1960s. I picked up the cloth (Iris) just last week in Amsterdam, but I had to get a new 12 x 24 mat for my Cricut, hilariously, just to properly cut these two simple lines long enough to wrap around the cover. I hadn't tried this technique before but it went fairly smoothly.

Featuring my first double-core endbands (please don't zoom in), a rounded and backed little text block, and chiyogami endpapers.

The typeset is simple and clean, letting the story be the most important thing.

With thanks to @magneticwave for permission to bind, and to @phoenixortheflame for feedback and encouragement.

[azriona]

Fanbind: Pages from a Broken Book

This project’s been in the works for a while—I think I printed and sewed the textblock a year ago—and then I ended up stymied on how to do the cover for so long, I forgot about it entirely and only found it again about three months ago.

The book is a compilation of several of my Doctor Who stories (all of which can be found on Teaspoon), most of which were cross-posted to LiveJournal. I ended up using a lot of graphics for the story breaks, and in this case, I found a Gallifreyan font that worked really well as decoration. A better printer probably could have made some of the pages look nicer, but eh; I worked with what I had at the time.

(More pics under the cut)

The cover was a lot trickier. I wanted something interesting, and it took forever to figure out what that interesting was. I finally decided to try my hand at doing a window, using the TARDIS as a frame, so that when you look through the windows of the TARDIS, you see the starscape endpaper on the inside. The board for the front of the book is actually two boards—one double-thick cardstock from a cereal box, and another slightly thinner piece, cut so that the thinner piece on top has a slightly larger window opening than the thicker bottom piece. That way, once it’s covered in bookcloth, there’s a sort of divot for the TARDIS to rest on, which hopefully will make it less likely to be knocked off after glueing, but still give it a 3-D effect. (But without the TARDIS, reminds me of a dreidel! 😂)

The TARDIS itself is out of thin cardboard, cut into several pieces so that I could cover them easily. I covered the board, back and front, with blue cardstock, and then ran all of it through an embosser with a wood-grain pattern. The lightbox on the top of the TARDIS has a window as well, with vellum and a bit of gold cardstock behind it to make it look like the lights on the top of the ship.

I cut the window in the board large enough so that when you open the cover…. you’ll see the back of the TARDIS as well. I probably should have added another lightbox at the top (I still might), so it looks a little more like it's floating in space. Or it would have been fun to put a little paper Doctor or Rose Tyler there, ready to run out and explore, but ah well!

The bookcloth is very a dark blue bookcloths from Hollander's, the endpaper is from Joanns (RIP). I decided against putting any text on the cover—it’s just on the spine—mostly because I couldn’t decide what I wanted it to say and opted for saying nothing. It’s my book, I do what I want.

Anyway, that's my book, and I'm super pleased with it. Thanks for reading!

[froidefille]

Hi Internet!! I made a thing!!!!

Bound: Slap Shots: A Hollanov Bind-This-In-Your-Style Shinny

📑 Typeset by the marvellous @citrusses and @phoenixortheflame

🖼️ Art/photo edits by the HR royal wallpaper maker @frenchnbookish

🪡 Bound by me! @froidefille

🎁 Gifted to my first IRL AO3 friend @ollliecat. I’m so glad we’re in this madness together 🥹

The biggest thank you, I love you, good job to shinny mods and participants and of course to the writers whose works we could bind 🤍 taking part in this together brought me so much joy!! Talk shop and process pictures under the cut 🤓

Okay so!!!! When designing this bind I listened to The Role Model and The Long Game mostly so it is mostly Ilya coded. I envisioned the blend color scheme of Boston Raiders (black+yellow) and Ottawa Centaurs (black+red). Hence velvet black cover material (don’t do this to yourselves, it somehow collected all the dust from my apartment in like 30 minutes), maroon endpapers and straw yellow ribbon.

For endpapers I also added some quotes from the show and the boys’ numbers and initials (notice H for Hollander is next to R for Rozanov which also makes HR for Heated Rivalry 🤓)

Shoutout to @shelfawarepodcast you can hear in the background, go give those ladies a listen, I love their talks so much!!

I also made my very first dust jacket!! Took an Uber across the city to have it printed and have been thinking about buying A3 printer ever since 🙃 made in Canva of course. I really miss Photoshop in times like these but alas, subscriptions.

Front and back covers as well as this post’s header were made using photo edits by @frenchnbookish. Do yourself a favour and check out her edits, they are honestly hilarious on top of being just SO.PRETTY. I gotta admit if not for this shinny, I would still figure out a way to make this particular edit a book cover because it totally absolutely 100% should be. Connor is somehow perfect Ilya here and Hudson is miraculously Shane-like 😅

Sewn using french stitch, glued spine then added endpapers. I managed to forget how to impose but @citrusses had my back 💛

Okay, I think that’s it! I’m sure I’ll think of something to add later on but oh well. I’ve only been writing this post in my head for a month so 😅

[phoenixortheflame]

Bound: Slap Shots: A Hollanov Anthology

This is a collection of one-shots featuring works by @smugrobotics, @hoko-onchi-writes, @arminaa8, @jtimu, @orolin-writes, Lately, @ghaniblue, @toomuchplor, @lemonlimelea, @citrusses, @its-the-allure, @greattemptation (plus one by me).

I wanted to host a chill binding event that was deadline-flexible and low-barrier for new binders. This meant no exchange and no typesetting.

Enter: The Bind-This-In-Your-Style Shinny!

The idea was simple:

Authors opted in to be part of the anthology.

Once all works were collected @citrusses and I created two versions of the same typeset: one letter and one A4.

Binders had four weeks to take that typeset and bind it in their style.

I already had art in mind that I wanted to use, but I wasn't sure the artist would let me. I shot my shot anyway, and he said yes! The piece—"Curious" by Brad Welch—is a graphite on bristol rendering of the seared-in-my-memory shower scene.

In exchange for letting me use his art, I made a copy of the bind for his own collection.

The endbands are made with with Trebizond silk thread using DAS's two-colour front bead method. I also hand-marbled the end papers.

It was my first time attempting a clear dust jacket, and I'm really happy with how they turned out. The transparent material is inkjet-compatible projector film, which a friend of mine recommended. The graphics were designed in Affinity Designer and applied with heat transfer vinyl.

As for the typeset, @citrusses and I met over video chat to set up the bones of it. We created a doc that detailed fonts and other design decisions made. Then we volleyed it back and forth until the thing was complete.

After having @dogearedbindery review the Letter typeset, we made an A4 version, which @mojowitchcraft looked over (thanks, pals!).

This was a super fun event, and I've loved seeing everyone's take on the bind!

Thank you to everyone who participated!

[maleekamolscreates]

Fan Binding of Alphabet Soup by @phoenixortheflame made as a gift for the author

https://archiveofourown.org/works/55321351/chapters/143868358?view_adult=true

This was a collaborative project between @sits-bound and myself. We knew we wanted to create something special for Phoenix, one of our dearest friends. Pam created this incredible typeset. The stag plays an important role, so we did lean into this theme throughout the typeset and physical binding. The story also features Harry as a journalist, so each chapter header is designed like a newspaper!

The dust jacket features art by the incredible @amomorii and depicts Draco and Harry entering Le Cerf from the muggle world and wizarding world, respectively. If you wanna know why they enter that way, and why the restaurant has two entrances, you need to read the story! We chose to put the title on the spine only because we didn’t want to cover all of the amazing details that the artist included.

The case is a split board case which allows the bind to open beautifully. DAS shows how to make this case on his YOUTUBE channel. The physical cover was made using mudbath duo cloth, a two tone cloth that I LOVE. We kept the design simple because the dust jacket art is really the shining star here. End pages were marbled by Maleeka.

Pam and Maleeka believe that one amazing part of fandom is the gift giving philosophy and we were honored to make this copy for the author. Keep fandom free and be kind, always.

[mojowitchcraft]

Slap Shots

A Hollanov Bind-This-In-Your-Style Shinny hosted by @citrusses & @phoenixortheflame

Each binder was given the same typeset and told to bind it in their style, so of course I went with a Snoopy theme! I've been absolutely loving seeing so many artists draw Shane & Ilya as Snoopy and Woodstock. Huge thanks to all the artists I reached out to who gave me permission to use their work in this bind! I ended up with more art than I knew what to do with and had to include it all.

Front Cover: @/marsabrinart Back Cover: @batsplash

More below the cut ⬇️

Gorgeous scenes by @/jellyfishcakes

Portraits by @batsplash | Skating by @fruitgravies

The typeset by @citrusses & @phoenixortheflame is so lovely! Brilliantly done 💕 Absolutely love the title pages and contents, they're so cool! And all the QR codes at the end hehe 🤳

Here’s a link to a collection of all the fics!

Plus, I added a little page to credit all the artists as well.

[sammialex]

Honorary book 69 (actually book 70) ✅ is a hollanov anthology bind event run by @phoenixortheflame and citrusses!! All of the included fics are free to read on ao3. This was such a fun event to participate in 🥹 this bind has a fully paper cover designed in silhouette studio based on the original heated rivalry cartoon cover with layered leather paper and shiny paper (both from Hollanders), hand foiled title down the spine, and woven hand sewn endbands, the top in Boston colors and the bottom in Montreal colors. A joy to create!!

[haxkattpress]

✨Adventures in Gauffering✨

As requested (albeit several months late) I have finally put together a video on my gauffering process!

Please take this video with a grain of salt– I am a complete beginner, and this method is far from traditional. It is simply what I was able to accomplish at my current skill level with the materials I had on hand.

For more in depth videos on sanding and edge painting, please check out @duran-binding and @copticcowgirl . They taught me everything I know!

There is so little instructional information about gauffering available online, particularly with budget materials. The amount of trial and error it took to establish a method that yielded fairly consistent results was frankly maddening, so I sincerely hope that this look into my process is useful to someone.

[hoechloin]

[plor-bindery]

Bound (Again): First Watch of Night by @tackytigerfic

I know I already posted my first go at this one, but I did a couple of changes on this author copy, so wanted to share again. The copy has now reached Tacky (hurray!) so I can exhale a sigh of relief as I think it's probably the best bind I've done to date.

I chose black book cloth this time, mostly because I was out of green? But also because I thought it would look nice!

The other significant change was that I tried my hand at edge painting for the first time! Thank you to @phoenixortheflame and @maleekamolscreates for the assistance on that endeavour. (Phoenix actually sanded that fore-edge for a while, so this is technically a collab.)

Have to include the shot I forgot to take myself last time, too: the delicious throw-up (that's the real term) of that curved spine with its sewn end bands.

And another thing I forgot to photograph last time: these fun chiyogami end papers:

And a final shot of the dust jacket which is the exact same as last time! But I just like it!

[moonboundbooks]

🧠 Creep by Croftisprocrastinating 🧠

I really wanted to do a sort of anthropology journal/schoolwork sort of thing with the brain as the focus since it's a large part of the fic. To add to the feel I added a table of contents and the chapter Author notes at the end of each chapter stylized as Reference Notes!

I dont have a cool Minc, so I (poorly) foiled the cover page and titles on the inside with my good old mini press.

And a bonus at the end with Creep Part 2 Epilogue, which was so so cute to read.

[plor-bindery]

Bound: Probationary Action by @toomuchplor (me)

A wee paperback edition of one of my first binds! I made this as a bonus for @tackytigerfic as I sent them their copy of First Watch of Night (which I'll post photos of later). They had very kindly requested one of my fics as a bind when I insisted on adding something to the parcel, so I brushed up this typeset and converted it to a hasty paperback.

I had been reading the excellent Slippery Creatures trilogy (read it!!) so I had art deco vibes on the brain, which incidentally went well with the peacock and keys themes of the fic. I decided to try a peekaboo cover cut-out because this is such a fun feature of paperbacks of a certain era. I used a decorative peacock paper as the inside art. The outside cover is printed, laminated with soft-touch, and then decorated with gold HTV.

Design by me! Even the keys! I drew everything myself in Illustrator.

For the printed insides of the covers, I went with the faux-legal probationary agreement text from my fic summary, and just a repeating key motif for the inside back.

Spines and back covers in the interest of completionism. Also featuring the @renegadeguild logo since I finally got up the courage to join officially as a member binder. (Imposter syndrome, what up?)

The second copy went to the inimitable @phoenixortheflame, who was very helpful in hammering out the design with me, and who also introduced me to K. J. Charles. Thanks, friend!

[phoenixortheflame]

Bound: Away Childish Things by @letteredlettered

Featuring art by: @the-forbidden-forest Typeset and bound by: me, @phoenixortheflame

Harry gets de-aged. Malfoy has to help him.

It's done! It's done! It's finally done! My contribution to @fandomtrumpshate 2025, with proceeds going to the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights.

The winning bidder requested a bound copy of ACT, and I pulled out allllll the stops for this amazing fundraiser. It features a cutout on the front cover, hand-sewn endbands, and a rounded and backed spine.

This was my first time making a case and/or box. Mistakes were made! Measurements were *not* accurate! But — for a first attempt — I’m pretty bloody happy. The embossing detail is done using the fox I cut out for the cover.

The whole design centres around this amazing Katazome-shi paper which I've been saving for the perfect fic. If you don't know the story, this paper was made by Mr. Kawakatsu, who owned one of the last remaining Katazome-shi production studios in Japan. He passed away suddenly this year with no succession in place. I was fortunate to get a single sheet of this paper, and I could not think of a more beautiful fic and more worthy cause to use it for.

This was my second time backing a spine, and I think it turned out really beautifully — though next time I will probably use one less sheet of paper per signature to emphasize the mushroom shape a bit more. Still, the book opens beautifully and the spine has a nice curve to it.

(This photo is for the binders specifically. I know you'll appreciate it.)

The typeset features the most beautiful, sweet, charming art by @the-forbidden-forest. She drew not only a full-spread piece for the full-title page, but also individual illustrations for each chapter.

(Amelia, I love you, you are a gift to fandom and I will cherish your friendship always!)

I will let Amelia share all the art, but for now, here is a peek at some of the gorgeous chapter head art she did. (Can you tell I recently learned how to add text to a path in Affinity?)

Okay a few details about the bind process + materials...

Process highlights

The case was made using DAS's two-part tutorial, Making a Clamshell Enclosure for Rare, Valuable or Fragile Books. Admittedly, I did find the measurements part very confusing, and it resulted in a not completely straight/flush case; however, I think now that I've done it once I'll be able to do it again — and better. As far as the process though, DAS nails it, as per usual.

The cut out was done using the same method I detailed here; however, instead of one layer of cardstock, I laminated two sheets together. I used a craft knife with a brand new blade, and the fox face that I cut out was in such good shape I was able to use it on the box cover to create an embossing effect.

The endbands are double core using @maleekamolscreates tutorial as a reference.

Materials highlights

The blue bookcloth is Verona brand in Midnight; the beige is Iris brand in Sandstone.

All endband thread is Trebizon silk thread.

HTV is Cricut brand.

Typeset paper is short-grain cream paper from Canada Papers.

As always, I couldn't have — wouldn't have — finished this project without all my people cheering me on, pointing me to various resources, and inspiring the hell out of me. @citrusses, @maleekamolscreates, @sits-bound, @haxkattpress, @epitomereally, @plor-bindery, @mlcbindings — thank you, all!