#half leather binding

[zhalfirin]

Die Mumins - Tove Jansson (The Moomins)

(Keep reading for full cover pictures, close ups of the endbands with a peek of the endpapers and links to the individual book posts)

Round up of my re-binding project of the Moomins books. I really enjoyed making them, but I'm also happy the project is complete now.

Back and front covers of the each of the books.

While I used some of the designs chosen for the book edition I had bought, I altered pretty much each of them to fit the size needed and/or also have an image on the back cover instead of the solid colour and a summary the published edition had.

The titles are printed with a metal cliché that I had custom made for that another binding and chose to use, instead of going for the full titles of the books. To indicate the volume I opted for dots above the title.

Endbands

I tried to also use the endbands to tie the different books together and picked one thread to be the leather colour or previous book and the others to fit the cover. I'm mostly happy how they came out. Only in the 3. book (where the colour shifts from violet to yellow-orange) the bead looks a bit irregular. Bead on the edge is simply not the endband style meant to be worked in such a pattern. I still like how it came out.

See the individual volumes here 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

This is the metal cliché btw

[zhalfirin-binds]

WIP - Geschichten aus dem Mumintal (Tales from Moominvalley)

Getting a smooth transition between leather and paper

I might have mentioned that before, but I'm not the most skilled when it comes to paring leather. Fortunately for me there are other ways. One way is to press down the leather while it's still moist from gluing.

I cover the spine with leather that is still rather thin (this one is 0,7mm), work in the hinges in and do the turn ins (I might reconsider to do this only after the leather is pressed down since it tends to bulk up a bit at the edge of the boars if done sooner).

Then I mark off the distance from the spine with a compass and leave a small indention as a guide.

I learned from experience that it's no good to put a thick steel ruler directly on wet leather though. They stick to the leather, get rusty and the rust can even stain the leather! So now I put some silicon paper (but honestly a plastic sheet would do just as well) between ruler and leather, align carefully with my marks and put it between boards into the press. It's important to use something with a sharp edge and considerably higher than the leather itself, otherwise the grain of leather can get crushed even where it's still supposed to show.

The result is a ridge that separates the leather with the visible grain and very smooth and very flat leather area that is almost level with the board and will barely show. (The stains visible at the edge are in fact water stains, I literally soaked my leather in paste to make it more flexible so this method had better results).

[zhalfirin]

Mumins wundersame Inselabenteuer - Tove Jansson

(Moominpappa at sea)

materials used:

inner book textblock - purchased book in signatures, (partially repaired with japanese tissue paper) endpapers - lokta, backed with Schirting (thin, seized fabric) endbands - buttonhole silk case boards - grey board 1,5mm spine stiffener - cardboard covering material, spine - leather (vegetable tanned) covering material boards - laser printed publishing paper cover art - original by Tove Jansson (altered for this case) title - hot stamped with genuine gold foil

original case of the purchased book

[zhalfirin]

Geschichten aus dem Mumintal - Tove Jansson (Tales from Moominvalley)

materials used:

bookblock - original book in signatures endpapers - tairei paper cover paper - laser printed publishing paper cover art - original by Tove Jansson (altered for this case) spine material - leather (vegetable tanned) endbands - buttonhole silk title - hot stamped with genuine gold foil

original cover

[zhalfirin]

The fisherman’s favour  - written by Laura Simons and drawn by Débora Cabral

(read the story here)

Dimensions: 11cm x 14,5cm x 1,5cm

Materials used: case binding: - coloured cardboard (270g/m²) - genuine leather (spinecover and headbands)

inner book: - Schleipen fly 05 (115g/m²) - coloured letter paper

[zhalfirin]

Diplomatic Relations - Maldoror_chant

Artwork by Kishimoto Masashi and an unknown artist (if anyone knows whose work it is please write so I can credit properly)

Materials used:

covers - cardboard (multiple layers) - slate veneer (translucent) - genuine leather (coated) - Tsumugi paper

book block - Munken polar 100g/m² - tracing paper - Satogami paper - headbands buttonhole silk 

With blank permission by the author for all her fandom related work there are two copies of this book now with only slight differences.

The slate veneer is slightly different in pattern since it is natural stone and you won’t get two pieces looking exactly the same

and I also had a slight alteration in the headband pattern

I also made an informations page thought that probably could do with more information on some parts...

[zhalfirin]

Die Mumins - Eine drollige Gesellschaft (Tove Jansson)

(Finn Family Moomintroll)

materials used:

original book in signatures coloured endpapers publishing paper (for printing the covers) leather (vegetal tanned) silk thread for headbands genuine gold foil (for hot-stamping the title)

See more of the WIP here

[zhalfirin-binds]

WIP Der Traum der Träume

Part II

Since there’s so much going to be ‘experimental’ with this book anyway I decided to add some more ot it. At the last binders fair I bought a sheet of papyrus paper (it’s really more of beaten papyrus fibres, one going short grain the other long grain) that I used for the cover. I have no idea how well it will hold up to wear and there were were some issues when applying it.

For one there are tiny holes here and there in the sheet. With the pale paper I used to even out the leather I could see it clearly shining through in some spots. To prevent that from being too obvious I gave the paper a light colouring so the bright cream wouldn’t glare through those holes too much. The papyrus is also very stiff and woodlike when dry. I moistened it to get it more supple to work with without breaking, that worked well enough. I also decided to work with wheat paste glue to not get any shiny spots from where the glue would press through the tiny holes that I already knew where there. Problem was, the glue takes some time to dry and it was hard getting the edges worked around and stick (when my patience dissolved I just gave the turn ins a coat of PVA and was done with them). The edges do not look great, but what concerns me more is the fact that the papyrus  fibers start to come apart where the paper has to go sharply around a corner. I let it dry and will check how much of an issue that is once it is dry. On the upside, my hidden corners are really well hidden and almost equally so.