Book Binding — Postcard Book

Spring 2019

Context

For my final project in my advanced book arts class, I decided to make a postcard book. My initial proposal:

Study in removable pages — postcard books
To utilize and share the many photos I’ve taken, I want to compile a set of postcards and transform them into a book, from which the cards can be removed, written on, and mailed out. The objective of this project is to test out different ways of binding pages together such that they can be easily removed in the future.

Process

Ideation

After doing some research, my initial ideas for a postcard book included using glue binding, perforated pages, or some sort of folder. Glue seemed like a simple, common solution, while perforated pages seemed easy but not elegant. I was interested in the various types of folders I saw, but knew these would take considerably more work.

Some inspiration:

Testing

In order to test, I first spent time getting the postcards out of the way. I chose to use the 88lb polar matte card stock from Red River Paper for it’s thickness and coated surface for photos. I prepped my files and printed, then cut down all of the postcards by hand. This ended up taking muuuch longer than I had imagined, but I was happy with the way they turned out. The coated photo paper gave the prints beautiful colors and a nice matte finish.

I first tested a simple edge glued binding, shown below. The process was quick and simple, and the postcards released with not too much effort. However, I didn’t like that there was a bit of glue residue left on the edge of the postcards. In addition, it wouldn’t be easy to peel out a postcard from the middle of the stack. I liked the idea of being able to shuffle through a stack of postcards to pick out the right one for the occasion, so I started to move towards the idea of a more box-like or portfolio style covering.

My professor brought out some examples of portfolio or box style coverings for me to play around with, including a wood border, folio style covering holding a set of printed poems, a trifold folio holding printed type specimens, and a box holding a hardcover book. Although I don’t have photos of all of them, I remember being drawn to the way the collections of paper nestled in the boxes, fitting seemingly perfectly in their containers. I also loved one of the examples that used wood to as a border for its contents. I played around with different proportions of covers and bordering, and ended up settling on a simple folio style book covering with wood bordering 3 sides of the postcards, acting as the sides of the “box.” The flap of the book would come up and cover the 4th side, enclosing the postcards completely.

Creation

After settling on a decided direction, I started planning out everything I would need to actually create the books. This ended up being something like:

• Book cloth — I picked a color I liked and ordered from Talas
• Postcards printed and trimmed
• Wooden sticks
• Paper for lining
• Toothpicks
• Clear pray paint
• Glue
• Book binding tools

The binding of the postcard book was actually quite similar to the traditional hard cover book covers I’d made in the past, although I had to be a bit more precise with the width of the spine to make the wooden borders fit just right. I made a template with the chipboard I was using for the covers and the papers I was using to be as precise as possible, and I made a couple quick prototypes of the cover as well. The borders also ended up being a bit tricky by themselves, as the edges where they were attached were simple right angles that needed support. We ended using toothpicks, whittling them down to a small pin size, and using them as mini dowels between the joints.

Throughout the process of making these postcard books (I ended up making a set of 2), I often felt like this project was a study in detail. Things like sanding down and spray painting the wood with clear lacquer, making multiple prototypes to get the spine width just right, and spending endless time making design decisions and precise measurements, often felt like more than should be necessary for such a small book, but they added up to result in a polished, confident final product. If i’d learned anything in my months of studying bookbinding, it was that the details are so, so important, and require a surprisingly significant amount of time, patience, and effort to get right.

Finished product

Final thoughts

Some considerations for the future:

• the card stock weight ended up being a bit too heavy for my preference, making the postcards a little unwieldy in shape
• the final form feels pretty sturdy, although it might be good to use a stronger glue between the wood borders for added security
• some sort of fastening function would ensure that the cover stays closed and postcards wouldn’t fall out easily — maybe… a magnet? tie? elastic?