#haxkattpress

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✨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.

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✨How to foil a book cover with a Silhouette Cameo 4✨

I've noticed some people in my tags expressing interest in the foiling process, so I'm uploading this foiling tutorial from my Instagram.

While I'm still a beginner myself, I'm more than happy to share resources with anyone interested in pursuing book binding as a hobby.

Happy binding!

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The Bolthole by aideomai, Tepre, and GallaPlacidia

I'm absolutely thrilled to finally share my first fic bind here on Tumblr! I completed this bind back in November, and it introduced me to so many wonderful people.

You can find pictures and detailed explanations of my process under the cut.

This is "The Bolthole" by Aideomai, Tepre, and (formerly) GallaPlacidia on Ao3. The cover design is adapted from "The Little Brother" (1902) by Josiah Flynt. The typeset is my own.

I fell in love with this cover the moment I saw it, and wanted to try to recreate it with book cloth. As a hobbyist book binder, I like to try to revitalize older designs from the public domain. There are so few copies of this book left in the world, so I thought it would be fun to give it new life as the cover of a contemporary story.

The cover is made out of three different colors of book cloth from the Allure and Verona lines. The book cloth and endpapers were bought from Hollander's.

I used my Cameo 4 and a strong tack mat to cut the design out of each color of book cloth. I then assembled the pattern like a puzzle. It was MUCH harder than it sounds! Some of the pieces were incredibly thin and fragile, and they were difficult to keep track of.

For the foiling, I used my Cameo 4 and the We R Memory Keepers fine tip foil quill for everything but the spine, which I did by hand. I foiled immediately after I cut, without removing my mat from the machine. This helped me line everything up. It did not, however, prevent me from sweating bullets as my machine worked.

This method was, frankly, torture, but I'm really glad that I tried it. Now that I've had a nice long break, I'd like to try it again soon. I love running my hands over this book, and the texture of the book cloth feels wonderful under my fingertips. I do, however, have a few words of caution. Do not try this out unless you have book cloth to burn! Here are some pictures of just a few of my failures.

The Cameo 4 is not your friend. Your cut-outs can and will get fucked up for no reason. If the mat isn't sticky enough, or the blade isn't sharp enough, or the fabric doesn't adhere properly, your design could get completely shredded. I strongly recommend that you avoid Verona book cloth, or anything with a paper backing and loose fibers. It was absolute hell to work with. When it wasn't shredded by the machine, it was fraying like crazy. Acrylic coated cloth is the way to go if you want clean lines. And, you know, your sanity intact.

This was my most challenging bind to date, but I learned a lot! Aside from experimenting with book cloth, automated foiling, and my Cameo 4, it was also my first time formatting, printing, and sewing a text block. I'm incredibly grateful for all of the online tutorials and wonderful people who helped me make this bind a reality!

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✨How to make inlays with a Silhouette Cameo 4✨

I finally slapped together a tutorial on my process for making inlays with my Silhouette Cameo 4! For higher quality you can visit my Instagram.

This is of course not applicable to all designs; if you have a design that goes across the spine and back cover, you will likely want to forego the transfer tape and attach your design to a piece of paper instead.

It should be noted that I am an amateur, and this is simply the method that works best for me personally.

Happy binding!