#BookBinding

[sanktalinn]

⟡ Dreamer trilogy⟡

[vellichorbindery]

My first jayvik bind!!

Coming Home (But Not to You) bound for the lovely author @lesbianherald thank you for writing this amazing fic 🥹💗

Artwork on the dust jacket & typeset is by the incredibly talented @byldthings YOUR ART IS JUST SO PRETTY TY!!

Book cover is made with homemade cloth + htv and then has a matching dust jacket with some shiny green htv with soft touch lamination.

Read this fic for free on ao3!

[firebound-press]

WITHOUT FURTHER ADO I PROUDLY PRESENT!!!!!! A FULL COLLECTION OF FISH N CHIP WORKS BY @earlgay-milktea !!!!!!!

My first ever leatherbound book!!!! Over 650 pages!!!!! My first time doing double core endbands!!!!! It’s all in here!!!!!!!!

It’s got custom graphics by @fishcop !!!! It’s got a couple graphics from me!!!!!! We’ve got it all!!!!!!

Ive been working on this book for over a year now and I’m so so proud to finally have it done. There’s a lot of stuff I could say about this bind but it mostly boils down to “holy shit I actually did it that’s so cool”

A lot of love and work went into this bind so if you have any questions please don’t be afraid to ask! Please!! I want to talk about it!!!!

Works featured:

Heart of the Sea

Breaking Free

Honesty Is The Best Fallacy

Captive Hero

Lovefool

Bitter Water

advancing on real ground

Wreck the Halls

Before Daybreak

You can also read Earls other work here:

https://archiveofourown.org/users/earlgay_milktea

[zenaidamacrouras1]

I made a typeset of Infinite Coffee and Protection Detail by Owlet. (You can download my typesets here - you have to ask permission to view).

You print it as a single volume or two volumes; I did both. I made the single volume with thinner paper (20lb) and the two volume version is 22lb paper. I am going to mail a copy to Owlet.

I made a lot of mistakes, my most annoying one is the thumbprint of glue on the spine of Vol 2, which maybe you can't see in this photo, but you can in real life. The holographic vinyl did not want to attach and ended up with issues. The cricut brand holographic vinyl is just not very good at adhering to surfaces (Siser brand is better in my experience).

I have bound a couple dozen books at this point, and I think one thing I have learned is that I am not that great at it. My results are never as perfect as they could be. It requires a level of precision and focus and passion for perfection that I don't really have. But I like the process. I like typesetting and folding paper. The books are pleasing to hold and you can read them and they are indisputably books. I think it's okay.

The moral of that story is that making things is not about perfection. Just make the thing. The time was going to pass anyway. It passed, and now I have some books to mail to people who will smile about it.

[sits-bound]

Bound: First Watch of Night by @tackytigerfic

When you decide to bind a book using black on black, it's not going to be easy to photograph. Just in case you were wondering.

@toomuchplor and I decided to do a little exchange of this fantastic fic, and this was the one I sent to her.

It's a long, long, long fic (274k) (and yet, I still didn't want it to end) and I couldn't decide if I wanted to bind it all in one volume and attempt to round it, or just leave it flat, even though it would be very thick, but then it occurred to me (or a friend suggested) that I could split it into two volumes!

So that's what I did. You know what was really cool? I divided it at the halfway point, after chapter 10, which worked out well. The page count was very similar, and the second volume had 11 chapters, so it was all very even.

But what I discovered was that the last line of chapter 10 is the same as the very last chapter of the book! I don't know if it was a coincidence or on purpose, but I thought it was neat. (I suppose that could be considered a spoiler which is why I'm not specifying what the actual sentense is, so please put this out of your mind if you haven't read this yet and you find yourself at the end of chapter 10.)

So anyway. Okay. I now had two volumes and had to decide how I wanted to differentiate them. I was going to do one white and one black, and while that would have looked cool, I fear it would have insinuated some kind of meaning (light vs dark) that isn't necessarily like, the first half vs the second half. And one of the ideas that had been knocking around my head was "searchlights". So that's where I went with the covers. I wanted all black, and I found a great sparkly black HTV (sorta starry nightish, you know) and went from there. I'm quite happy with how it came out!

Except I meant for the two searchlights to be facing away from each other when you put both volumes next to each other, but if that's the only mistake I made, I can live with that.

I'm especially proud of the silhouettes on the spine, they both started as photographs that I pulled into Adobe Capture and was able to turn into SVGs so they could be cut by my silhouette. And I'm extra proud of my Silhouette for keeping Harry's glasses intact. (I tried just finding clip art of silhouettes (too many uses of that word here) but for whatever reason, most silhouettes are of businessmen?!? Anyway. It all worked out.

The title pages for each volume are slightly different too. The first has one figure, the second has two. Just a little thing.

The bookmark charms are a little 1 and 2 I made with shrinky dink material.

More details:

This is the HTV I used The body font is Arno Pro (my beloved) The cover font is Montserrat The chapter and drop caps are in various forms of Lulo The small caps at chapter starts is Rig Shaded Images came from Pixabay

[madebytaylorursula]

My Etsy and insta/tiktok is @madebytaylorursula

These are my Stormlight Novella rebinds! These were so much smaller than I anticipated, but I still managed to keep a lot of detail in the designs

[keystonepublishing]

The Dreamwalker by Hydre

When I first stumbled on this fic, I knew I found something I wanted to bind. And after 3 months of work, it's finally finished!

At 135,787 words, The Dreamwalker by Hydre (@leva-prava) would be the second-longest fic I'll bind. But it's so worth it! The fic is soooooo good! Tommyinnit getting transported to our world? While asleep? And meets alternate versions of his friends and enemies? And gets cared for by an alternate Dream? Who genuinely cares? Where have you been all my life.

After my last time binding something this massive, I've since learned a few new techniques that would further stabilize the book and enhance it, like endbands! And ribbon bookmarks!

From the start, I wanted this fic to have a distinct visual feel: Home and house. Solid-minimal headers. Distinct-yet-unobtrusive page numbers. Distinct section breaks to visualize how drastic things can change.

The house was particularly important. The fic has heavy themes of home and belonging and I wanted a silhouette of a house that could convey that. But after weeks and weeks of trawling through the internet to find AI images of houses, I manned up and drew my own from scratch (with the exception of the tree as a stock image from elsewhere). It now dots every page and every chapter!

Cracks indicate sudden scene shifts, black with white line indicate a peaceful transition, and a black line shows a scene break within the same day, setting, or action that is relatively minor in importance.

I also packed in so many subtle details into the text such as different fonts for political campaigns, back-lighted words to convey terrible memories, comm chat, text messages, even darkened pages for dream sequences.

The fic writer also made drawings of some parts of The Dreamwalker and so I tried my best to lighten them up and add them into the pages at their relevant plot spots! Some of them were a bit of a challenge - you'll notice the double-page confrontation of Wilbur and Tommy is less-cleaned up, because I couldn't find a way to brighten them without losing the pencil work. Dammit!

And lastly, I added the chapter notes as footnotes in almost every chapter in a way to save the meta-text, which were important in their own way as they explain the author's thoughts, motivations, and directions for the characters within the fic.

All in all, this entire bookbinding took 3 months and many days from beginning to end. I worked this intermittently with other projects as to not be burnt out, and I think I have delivered a bind that does some justice to this fic. Go read it! And full thanks to Hydre / @leva-prava for such an amazing fic!

[starblightbindery]

My personal goal is to try and make fanfic binding as accessible to everyone as possible, so here are some resources on how to make a fanfic hardcover for under $25.

This is a barebones bind for the broke college students and such. Happy to field questions, too!

Here's a proposed budget breakdown:

Loosely organized thoughts:

Fanfic bookbinders often share typesets amongst each other. Never pay for a typeset for a fanfic.

You'll hear a lot about grain direction for your printer paper, but as a newbie on a budget without your own printer, settle for some nice 92 bright paper. If you like the hobby, splurge after but expect to pay at least 2-3x more for short grain paper.

Printing is a pain because some copy shops won't let you print intellectual property smut, and it's very expensive. You are better off bartering instead or looking for a free printer on Buy Nothing.

You know the thick paper wrapping that comes with online orders? It's a good weight for endpapers if you need to scrounge. Paper grocery bags or gift bags (birthday presents) might work, too.

Ask your local library to give you covers from books they are throwing out. Ask for outdated textbooks (those covers are built like tanks) or three-ring binders that are too busted to be binders anymore.

Obtain a used book that was mass produced (so your destruction of it does not impede anyone's access) and maybe even become a little vindictive with it.

If you can afford it, I recommend the Olfa SVR knife (~$10)

If you can afford it, upgrade your ruler to a t-square.

I really hope this resource is helpful! I want to stress how possible this is and encourage people to cherish what they love through art.

If you are interested in fanfic binding and have a little more disposable income, I have an affordable Fan Fiction Bookbinding Starter Pack that I carry on my site. I pack them myself and drop them 1x/month on the 15th.

[crystalline-fragmentation]

I bound @betweenlands 's fic the captain's dead! (banger fic very very good). I started this back in January, got distracted, and have finally managed to finish :D

This was a very fun project! There were a few hiccups but overall I think it turned out very well. All the other booklets I've made have been for class, so doing it for fun was a nice change. I'm especially proud of how the page layout came out :>

(link here for details on how I made it!)

[sanktalinn]

⟡The Raven Cycle + Dreamer trilogy⟡

[cawmeraman]

sweetest memory to live through ever. getting to present my poetry book as a graduation project and seeing positive feedback in real life.

super proud of the end result. somehow it baffles me that I made the entirety of it despite literally being a bookbinding/restoration major.

it's named after my grandma since sadly she didn't live long enough to see my work. To me, my grief is the leftover love I'm can't give back or as one of my poems says.

"when my I love you so much

won't seep through the grass

to your very casket"

so I made that leftover love into this book.

It's illustrated as well !

here are my favourites.

the majority of it is in slovak btw but I tried to pick the parts where english made an apprearance.

anyway, my favourite teacher told me she's proud of me, i gotta go cry myself to sleep real quick.

[jaybinds]

Love this

author copy of heartless I made for @thisliminalspacedaydreams since it took me so long to get our trade bind done 😅

I drew the little Regulus and the kraken and the background on the dust jacket which was a fun challenge

[wrenthetitmouse]

Major shout-out to men that craft. Dudes that knit. Fellows that felt. Bros that bind books. Cobbers that cross-stitch. Y'all are wonderful and I appreciate you.

[thingsidrawgohere]

Alright. I'm calling it done before it kills me. This is Second Head. It's an Art Book containing instances of the phrase "second head" in fanfics found on AO3. I'll explain much, MUCH more in the cut.

So when I say 'art book', I mean this is an intrinsic piece. I have no motivations aside from personal amusement and interest in outcome. A lot of money was lost/transmuted into free frustration in this project and I have no claims, obviously. I will prolly be the only person alive to read this.

THAT SAID. I have noticed in my years reading fanfic, there's a few linguistic shibboleths that arise in authors who also have experience in the mines. I think there's not a soul alive who hadn't wandered across a 'ministrations' when reading Narutos oral sexing. There's- Hold on. Here's some pix.

There's an impulse, I think, to in-group even when performing a creative act. A feeling that there are certain ways one Should go about the act, by virtue of seeing it performed that way. Especially so when 'training' at the act is often just Doing. Double Dog Especially when the act is exclusively for oneself with very little oversight. Which is to say, we make what we see and we make what we think we should make. At least, at first.

Now, I've been noticing 'grew a second head' (to insinuate surprise) in fanfic for some time. I've never seen it used Outside of fanfic. (Edit to add: I am not making the argument the phrase is from fanfic. Nor do I Believe it is from fanfic. Jesus Hopping Christ, people. That's not what this project is about.) That may speak to my own bad habits but it got me curious. So a friend and myself downloaded a mirror of AO3 from July of 2024. He did some code- Stuff to scan the mirror for "second head" and of the ~13 million works, ~70k (English) results were returned. That's a rounding error, honestly, but Far FAR more than I expected.

This book is 401 such examples that I personally selected for a variety of reasons. The number itself was arbitrarily chosen. Each page is separate fic, the roughly 300 words around our key phrase.

I don't think repetition or mirroring is a negative thing. I think it's quite charming. Nor do I think it's a sign of a 'bad' artist or 'bad' art. I think it's a signifier of personhood, of belonging, of enthusiasm. Of culture shared and wishing to share. I think it's real sweet. I always smile when I catch a 'grown a second head' in a work.

And it's really fucking funny when it's John Sherlock getting a sloppy toppy. Bless.

Edit: Fixed a very VERY funny error.

Edit: I am not making the argument that the phrase is exclusive to fanfic or, fucking forbid, FROM fanfic. I'm stating this Again because we skim here. Also- If you would like slamdunk my ass by stating the phrase predates the Internet or your GenX parents use it, please use 'sailboat' in your comment so I know you're specifically trying to kill me.

Edit Edit: You know what? Fine. I DO think this phrase came from fandom. I think ENGLISH came from fandom. I think YOU came from fandom. I think EVERYTHING came from fandom. The Sun, the Moon, the Seas- Fandom. Specifically Sonic Mpreg. The second head was Shadow the Hedgehog crowning. Congrats!