Showing posts with label Hedi Kyle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hedi Kyle. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Secret Belgian Binding

The Secret Belgian Binding was rediscovered by Hedi Kyle. I came across a copy of the instruction manual at Syracuse and decided to try the binding style. This is my Belgian:
 
The sewing was a little difficult. The hardest part was the getting the signatures attached to the spine sewing. I was using a pre-cut  text block, and cut my boards to fit that. My book was shorter and more square than the instructions size, and I wonder if my text block would have slipped less if I used the taller, rectangular dimensions.
The book cloth I chose caused the most problems. If I covered the boards too soon after applying the PVA, the glue caused the cloth to darken in several spots. I had to wait to for the glue to be almost entirely dry, then cover the board and reactive the PVA using a tacking iron. I also mistakenly tried to cut the corners at a 45 degree angle, and fold them over. This fabric frayed excessively after I folded the corners, and I had to apply some glue to keep the fibers down. If I was to use this book cloth again I would try lining it with Japanese tissue or even a different style of corners (Fall 2009).