Posted on

Bookbinding and the Unexpected Everyday Object

Custom bookbinding is an old tradition and pretty niche
industry. Whether a binder makes handsewn embossed leather tomes or sleek modern structures like our screwpost portfolios, albums and portfolio boxes, most of us in this industry got into our profession, at least in part, because of our love of books: their form, their varied structures and their roles in our everyday lives: as beautiful and protective capsules for important text, images and information. But every so often a job calls for us to reframe our roles as bookmakers to create something a little more unorthodox.
We enjoyed our recent collaboration with Garnica Interiors to create these beautiful and hardy boxes as a smart clutter
solution for a client’s laundry room. The larger of the boxes features a
magnetic front for easy access as it will sit high on a shelf, and the custom
turquoise color ordered specifically for these boxes matches the tile in the
room. We hope for photos and can’t wait to see how they are incorporated in the
space.

 

 

This recent job also brings to mind the deceptively simple
flax linen storage boxes we made for another of Garnica’s clients a while back, among other home furnishing orders. These sleek, utilitarian containers are all function without sacrificing form, with the quiet power to transform a domestic or working space into a more serene, productive space.
Days like these have us thinking it might be time to really
step up our own laundry room game! Why not update the old Ikea Kallas with something a little more chic and coordinated to the room’s color scheme? Why suffer flimsy corrugated file boxes or that weird junk shelf under the entryway table when you have hearty bookboard and a variety of bookcloth colors to choose from?
Posted on 1 Comment

The Jet Box

There are some projects that I just don’t want to let go of. Today I shipped out one such project. It was a very special jewelry box that has come to be know as “the jet box”. I had such a hard time letting this one go because I’ve spent so much time and energy designing and building it over the past month.
The client is a newport beach CA based luxury jeweler (not called Ologon as the label may suggest) and the assignment was to build a traveling jewelry box that could be carried aboard a private jet for the passengers to browse through. It had to have 5 drawers of differing depths, a matching removable mirror, a pocket for printed materials, a secure closure, a handle and it had to be covered in this metallic silver bookcloth that I’ve been using for all of the other presentation pieces that I’ve made for this client.
There are a lot of components involved here and they all need to fit precisely together so this had to be built one piece at a time from the inside out.
I started with the drawers. The first step was to build simple square trays covered inside and out in the silver bookcloth. At this point I couldn’t add the facades because I needed to know how the drawers would sit in their cases and take precise measurements from there. The facades needed to line up perfectly.
The next step was to create the case for the drawers. Working with bookboard and glue is entirely different than working with wood and nails so it wasn’t going to be as simple as building one large box with runners for each of the five drawers. The drawers need more support than that. Each drawer needed to have it’s own box that it could slide in and out of so I essentially built a lined slipcase for each drawer, covered the front edges in the silver bookcloth and then stacked them up, glued them and pressed them. In the very top section I had to cut out 2 squares so that the screws and washers that secure the handle would be recessed, otherwise the drawer wouldn’t open completely.
At this point the facades could be made. They needed to cleanly cover all the edges of the slipcases so that when looking at the open jet box all you’ll see is drawers and none of the structure holding them. Considering this box would be on a jet, the finished product couldn’t be too bulky, it needed to take up as little space as possible so knobs and handles weren’t an option. I decided to go with notched pulls, they don’t take up any space and seem to work well with the overall simplicity of the design.
Next I built a large sturdy double walled box to hold the stack of drawers. Knowing that the completed jet box with all the jewelry inside would be quite heavy, I didn’t trust that the double layer of bookboard on top could support all that weight. I did a test by stacking bricks inside of the box and lifting it up by the top. This determined that more support would be needed so I added a piece of 1/4″ plywood and wrapped it and the seams with fabric and this absolutely did the trick. I did a second test with even more bricks and it held up very well with no bowing at all. The only parts of this component that will be seen are the 1/4″ front edges so I wrapped them with the silver bookcloth.
I then created a cover to surround this large box. The cover wraps around 3 sides and has a door at the front and a flap that attaches to the right side of the box with super strong hidden neodymium magnets. These are sure to keep the box closed even in turbulence. On the inside of the door is a liner with a pocket to hold the printed material. For the finishing touch, both the door and the liner have small insets where an engraved plate with the company’s logo will be placed. I then glued the cover to the large box one side at a time, made liners for the top and bottom of the box, glued them on and then measured very very carefully for the handle placement and then drilled the holes for the handle screws. At this point I thought I was home free but soon realized there was one thing that I didn’t consider, how was I going to fit a screw driver into a 1″ space? Back at the hardware store, the problem was quickly resolved when I saw the allen keys. I could use socket screws with an L shaped allen key. This was a great solution but wouldn’t have worked for anyone with hands larger than mine, there was just enough space.
Lastly for the mirror I decided on a folder structure that when opened would reveal the framed mirror. I secured ribbons on either end so that when the folder was folded back onto itself, the ribbons could be tied and the mirror could stand up on it’s own in an A frame style on top of the Jet Box. All the bases were covered and I finished the job feeling very satisfied. It isn’t every day that I have to design a jet box but it sure was an exciting challenge…..I’m already looking forward to the next one.
To see more of the custom work that has come out of the studio please visit the custom showroom at www.kdbooks.com
Posted on 1 Comment

Big Box

This is the largest box I’ve made to date and I’m really excited about the possibilities it has opened up. I had always seen the 38″ x 26″ dimensions of the bookboard as the limit. After watching a home improvement show about how laminated plywood beams are made I decided that more than likely those limits didn’t exist. For each of the 11 pieces that make up the structure of the box, I cut 4 strips of .059 bookboard and laminated them, overlapping the seams of each. The box measure 42″ long, so I used one piece of 38″ and one piece of 4 1/2″ and reversed the placement on each layer. After the glue had dried I trimmed the ends down to the proper length. This produced a super strong and stable piece of bookboard that I knew could support the weight of the finished box. Since the box is so large it was important to build it with 1/4″ walls, standard 1/8″ walls would have made for a very flimsy and unwieldy structure. Trimming the pieces was a bit tricky. As with the pieces of any box it is so important that they are cut at perfect 90 degree angles through their width. 1/4″ thick pieces do not fit into the board cutter so they are all hand cut. It takes a real steady hand and perfect attention to keep the blade straight when cutting through that thickness. Once all the pieces were finally trimmed and glued, I covered the box in a lime green linen cloth and lined the trays with a deep wine colored Dupioni silk. I really like this color combination and am very happy with the finished product. I’m looking forward to applying this new technique to the creation of some unique and impressive custom portfolio and presentation pieces.

Posted on 1 Comment

Unrequited

This was a fun project but I have to say I was a bit hesitant when my client said that he wanted his book printed on parchment. The thought of cutting, folding and stitching animal skin made my pescatarian stomach a bit uneasy, but I decided I was up for the challenge.

After the book layout was complete, the paper was purchased from Pergamena in New York, sent out to a printing company that specializes in printing on parchment and then shipped to me in Long Beach. When it arrived at the studio, I cautiously opened the package and was surprisingly delighted at what I saw. Each page was unique and beautiful with varying textures and colors, no two were alike.
Of course working with parchment is nothing like working with paper so it was a learning process, fortunately a smooth one. Each sheet had to be trimmed carefully as the printing was not consistently in the same place on each sheet. Then each sheet was scored, folded and pressed overnight. Next the signatures were collated, station holes punched and finally the book block was stitched, glued up, pressed again and then into the guillotine for a final trimming. The client wanted suede endsheets with a decorative border stitching. He also wanted the endsheets to be one continuous piece so I cut the suede to fit the bookblock, ran it through the sewing machine for the decorative stitching and then stitched the suede wrap to the bookblock.
The raised ligature on the front cover was hand cut and then carefully covered in a dark brown leather. The book’s title, “Unrequited” was foil stamped on the spine in 22K gold on the Kwikprint and finally the bookblock was cased in, pressed for a few days and turned over to a very happy client who then passed the gift on to it’s intended recipient.
Posted on 2 Comments

Making Envelopes

This project was not typical of what comes through the studio but it was certainly a fun diversion. A very special client of mine from San Francisco put in her yearly request for year end gifts for the students at her daughter’s school. This year it was these sturdy and colorful envelopes that will hold 4 x 6 photos taken throughout the school year.

Choosing the papers was the first step and of course the most fun. We met at my favorite paper store on earth, Flax Art & Design in San Francisco, and spent some time finding the perfect papers for the kiddos. Next, back in Long Beach, using PVA and a paint roller, I carefully laminated these very thin almost wrapping paper papers together with their much heavier liner papers and pressed them overnight. The next day after crunching the numbers, with a little trial and error, I creating a template out of bookboard and trimmed the now heavyweight paper to size.
Scoring, hole punching and eyelet setting were next and then came folding and gluing the paper into it’s 3 dimensional form. The ribbon was threaded through the eyelets and finally the 21 name plates were laid out, printed and adhered to the inner flap of the envelope.
I really enjoyed having these colorful envelopes around the studio for a few days. They were a nice change from the standard black clamshell portfolio boxes that so often taking up the space on my pressing table.