As the Christmas decorations came down and were packed away for another year, we found ourselves wondering whether we could give some of the waste material a new life beyond simply chucking it in the recycling bin. We took a pile of festive wrapping paper and a few Christmas cards out to the bindery to see what we could do! With a few sheets of A4 printer paper, a needle and thread, and something to cut with, we were able to make a cheerful set of little paper notebooks that

It is always tricky for me to decide whether bookbinding is a craft or an art. I have had many discussions with people over the years at craft fairs and on courses about exactly what bookbinding is. I have always said it is a craft and yet my work has been exhibited in Art exhibitions. It is certainly a creative endeavour as whilst making a new book you are constantly making aesthetic and creative decisions. The late Sir Ken Robinson ( https://www.sirkenrobinson.com/) de

by James Fox (Penguin Audio, 2025) I spend a lot of time working quietly with my hands, and find that a good audiobook or podcast can be an excellent accompaniment to the hours spent at the spinning wheel or weaving loom. It’s a real opportunity to keep learning and be curious about the world beyond our doorstep, and my current audiobook choice is testament to this. I’ve just been listening to an unexpectedly fascinating description of Britain’s last working bell foundry in L

Someone asked me the other day, ‘What’s your favourite thing to spin?’ Without hesitation, I replied ‘Blue Faced Leicester.’ I love its softness and willingness to be spun finely, the array of subtle natural colours and even appreciate the nominative nod to the city of my birth! However, it got me thinking about wool. When demonstrating spinning, I often talk to people about the benefits and qualities of wool that make it such a useful and valuable material, so thought I sho

I was approached by a client to ask about binding together all of the editions of these societies' journals into a matching set of volumes. Each volume is composed of two years, each with its own individually printed journal. A few of the journals collected had already been bound, some in cloth and some in half leather but they all needed pulling apart in order to ensure that all of the volumes matched. Most of them came as uncut printers copies whereby the printer had fold

Most of the books we work on are at least 100 years old, and many are much older. Books are really robust and can last for many hundreds of years, but they do need looking after. Here's five tips to help you keep your cherished books for future generations. Keep them away from the sun Direct sunlight can cause several problems with books. Firstly , the UV in the sun can cause the pigments in the cloth or leather to fade. This leads to your books having faded spines but or

Book binding stage by stage by David Allsop of Old School Crafts

The quiet, meditative actions of handweaving often allow room for thought and reflection. While weaving the other day, I was reminded of a passage of ancient Hindu scripture, where the brilliant female philosopher Gargi questions the great sage Yajnyavalkya about the nature of the universe and existence, and uses weaving as a metaphor to explain the interconnectedness of all things. Starting with water, Gargi asks a series of questions about what the various parts of the univ