Tools and Supplies—Understanding Some Terms

April 16, 2015
Tools and Supplies—Understanding Some Terms
Early questions from students interested in registering in the May 2015 Simple Round Back
Spine online class, or from registered students raised some interesting points that I wanted to
share with you before class began. Please note that in class you will see images of various tools
etc., but I’m concerned that if you’re new to bookbinding you might be stumped by some of
the vocabulary used to explain some of the tools.
First, it is very important to me that you understand
my philosophy on bookbinding is that it can be done
without expensive tools and expensive (often
antique) binding equipment.
and dedicated fabric scissors for bookbinding. That
would make me sad, as you may get glue on them.
A board sheers is actually a large, free-standing
piece of equipment that appears at the bottom of
column one.
I am not encouraging you to buy any such
equipment.
In my PDF of supplies I list it in optional items—the
only reason I list it is because some of you may be
near a community craft facility or an organization
like MCBA (Minnesota Center for Book Arts). I do
not have one of these and I rent time at MCBA to cut
my full sheet binder’s board into smaller pieces so
that I can cut my board at home on a smaller table
top version of this devise that is 24 x 24 inches.
One student was curious if a “board sheers” was a
special type of scissors used for binding. No. Any
pair of scissors can be used in this class for the few
cutting tasks that are appropriate for scissors. If you
work with fabrics, please don’t use your expensive
If you don't have access to one (they are used to cut
your bookboard) you can cut board with a utility
knife and a metal straightedge and I walk you
through that in one of the videos.
Many people, myself included have home-paper
cutters like the one shown here.
You can find something like this at office max,
staples, maybe Joanne's. They sell from 35 dollars
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and up. If you have large sheets of binder's board to
cut down you obviously need the largest one that will
fit the full sheet of the board. But I cut my boards in
half at MCBA on their board shears and then bring
the halves home and they fit my 24 inch square cutter.
I am not advocating that you get such a cutter for
class.
use them to trim
the edges of their
textblocks before
they case their
books in. You
should NEVER
cut binder's
board with a
guillotine
because the
board contains
imperfections
that can nick the
blade and then
every stack you
cut will have a
miss cut edge on it. Someone at MCBA actually did
that with the guillotine one year and we had to use a
damaged blade. One of my videos actually shows
what happened to the book I made and trimmed using
that nicked blade.)
I looked up some table paper cutters to show the
student and it is interesting that I found venders using
labels like this: "Square Guillotine Paper Cutter."
In my neck of the woods something with a angled
arm like this paper trimmer, whether table or floor
size, are always called paper cutters (for the table
type) and board shears for the floor model.
A guillotine paper cutter is shown at the top of the
right hand column. It is obviously an old and
expensive bit of equipment. Guillotines are used to
trim large STACKS of paper and also some binders
Useful Links to Supplies Found by a Student Shopping at Talas
While several of you are taking advantage of the discounted supply set available at Wet Paint,
many of you may need only one or two items. A student found these items at TalasOnline.
Irish Linen Thread in spools,
instead of on a card. (Get the 35/3
size as spec’ed in your handout.
This spool will last you for many,
many books.
Linen Sewing Tape. Get the 3/8
inch width. Obviously the 10-yard
roll is going to last you for a lot of
books.
Davey Binder’s Board in 20 x 30
inch sheets. You’ll want the .070
inch (1.8 mm; 1/15”) width/
thickness.
Note: Images shown in the Talas section are pulled from their website to help you identify them.
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One student asked if this Linen
Bookbinding Cord from Talas was
suitable for the “TWINE” needed
in one step of our process. I do not
know. It maybe. I have ordered a
spool of the 12 cord and will let
you know. I cannot judge when
looking at this photo, it’s real
thickness and softness. Twine
from the hardware or craft store
should cost only a couple dollars
and be readily available. It should
not have a hard braided surface,
that’s critical. I talk more of this in
class. You might want to hold off
on this until you watch the
introduction.
Hahnemühle Gutenberg paper, you
need to get the 130 Gsm sheets.
classes through the MCBA shop.
When choosing a color of
bookcloth remember that we are
using a paper that is a yellowishcream. It will go with most colors,
but with this wide selection I
would avoid any white or cream
cloths and stay with warm like
burgundy, red, orange, and the
greens. You can order multiple
yards at a time, so if you really
love a particular color and plan to
make many books, and are already
ordering from Talas, this is an
economical way to get bookcloth.
If you are going to order several
items from Talas online they carry
wide selection of bookcloths in the
Asahi Bookcloth line. These are
excellent and I get them for my
Why I asked Wet Paint to Put Together a Special Discounted Supply Set…
Where you purchase supplies for my bookbinding
classes is totally up to you. I realized, however that it
would be frustrating for students new to bookbinding
to purchase some of the odd-ball materials. I have
been a long-time customer of Wet Paint (a local
independent art supply store) and they have helped
me create supply sets for my in-person classes (color
theory, color pencil, etc.). I asked the manager Darin
Rinne if he could put together supplies for this class
in the same fashion and he came back to me with an
outstanding discount on the selected materials. Those
materials can also be purchased at Wet Paint
individually at the regular store price.
items that are easy to find in most art supply stores
were left out of the discounted set. But I selected
items from stock that you could purchase from Wet
Paint should you wish to do one-stop-shopping.
That’s all present on the set page.
It is critical that you use the same paper and Bristol,
and boards, etc. from the supply list, so that you can
create a successful book. It will be impossible for me
to help you overcome problems in construction if you
aren’t using the same materials—too many variables.
My class contains discussion on how to modify this
book for other papers once you know the structure.
Since many students may already have scissors, and
even have a metal ruler or bone folder, several of the
Please note I receive no payment from Wet Paint.
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