How I Make Tiny Art Books

Version II

Tiny concertina softcover art book, 1-1/8" square

I have loved tiny books since I was a kid, and I used to both collect them and make them. I usually made them with staples, because as a kid, that seemed like the most logical binding, but I also experimented with string, tape, and brads. I would draw comics in them, usually cats, after they were bound, which was rather ass-backwards of me.

So now I'm a wee bit older and I still love making books (and I still have 4 tiny books from my original collection). I wanted to show how I made this one, which is composed of thick black paper, parchment style paper, hand-carved stamps, and a ribbon closure. All materials are archival safe.

How it's Made:

It always begins with a pencil drawing.

After sketching out the moon phase cats, I transferred the drawings to pink stamping material and carved each one by hand. I love the primitive look of hand stamping and I wanted this book to be reproduceable, but still maintain the look of an original art piece, like a lino print.

I chose a concertina style that it could double as a display.

After the stamps were carved, I made some paperboard templates (so I can reproduce the book more easily) and then started cutting paper. Below you can see the parchment pages after they are cut and in the process of being folded. I made a folding guide to help keep the folds even.

Next, the images are stamped on the paper. I used a wooden guide that my Dad made for me to help position the stamps.

After the cats were stamped, I used some tiny Japanese hiragana stamps that were commercially produced to write tsuki to neko, or "moon and cat," which I stamped in traditional tategaki format: vertical columns read from top to bottom, right to left.

And for the finishing touch on the artwork, I used a hand carved star stamp which I have affixed to the flat end of a colored pencil for easier stamping (I didn't have any wood dowels on hand, so this worked!)

While the ink-stamped pages dried, I began work on the cover. I outlined it using my template, then cut it out, folded the edges in, and folded the spine.

Then I added PVA glue to the inside of the edge folds and pressed them down to create clean, re-enforced edges for the cover.

This version of the book has one of the stamps as cover art, which I cut out and glued to the cover using a glue stick:

Then I attached the ribbon closure with PVA glue. Concertinas are rather springy and don't like to stay closed on their own. Unless you're using a heavy cover material, most require closures of some sort. I put a bit of glue on the cut ends of the ribbon so they do not fray.

After this, I glued the endpaper to the back inside cover:

And finally, I glued the actual concertina pages into the book:

They are glued in place so that when folded, they tuck into the spine. The end remains loose so that the pages can be completely unfolded and stand on their own for display.

And here's the finished book: