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Although you may not be a bookbinder as such, you're still making covers for books, so you're at least part way there! Bookbinding leather is usually quite thin (comparitively speaking), better quality and has been specially treated. It moulds very well and also takes tooling. Hewits sell a lot of small leather working tools too. If you're ever staying in the Edinburgh area on a future visit, it's just a bus ride from the city centre. They have a website HERE, which will give you an idea of their range, but they don't show the low value skins on it though as you really have to sort through them to find what you want. I've never been to the Isle of Islay, I know the south of Scotland reasonably well as I don't live too far from it, the furthest north I've ever been is Inverness.

Nice work, but I wish I'd seen this post sooner, especially before your trip to Scotland. Do you know about Hewits, the bookbinding supplier just outside Edinburgh? They sell off what they call "low value skins", skins with small holes or other flaws in them. You can pick up some great stuff at a fraction of the normal price.

Sorry, I got an error message when I clicked send and thought that the previous message had vanished into a black hole. This was just a duplicate reply.

What a lovely idea! The nicest gifts are always the ones that someone has taken time and trouble to produce. Your niece should be thrilled to bits. I live in north east England, so although I do know of sources where you could probably find the paper/card you need, they're here in the UK, which isn't a lot of use to you! Are there any art shops near you? A lot of the paper they stock is acid free and there's usually a good range of colours and thicknesses. I've also seen an aerosol you can buy that neutralises the acid in paper. You spray it on and hey presto, you have acid free paper. I'll add a link to the shop I where I saw it, the last time I was in London. If you google it, there could well be stockists in the US too, but be warned, it's a very small can and very expensive! http://store.falkiners.com/store/product/6...okkeeper-Spray/

I've never made an album, but I think they're small strips of thick paper or card that are folded and inserted between each page. In an ideal world, they'd be the same thickness as the photos you intend to insert. When the album is finished, but still empty, the spine end will be much thicker than the outer edge. When the album is full of pictures however, the spacers would ensure that it would be the same thickness at both ends. It's hard to see in the pictures, but I think there are 3 signatures, with spacers in the two innermost ones.

Thanks for the welcome and the compliments. I try to rebind in a style that's in keeping with the age of the book. The one in the picture is over 200 years old for example. It needed to be completely restitched, so I did the stitching on cords, that were then "laced" onto the boards, because that's the way it was done originally. It was printed before bookcloth had been invented, so a cloth binding of any description wasn't an option. Although the original binding was full leather, half leather bindings and hand marbled paper were very popular in those days, so that's what I chose to do. (Again, the book pre-dates the first machine marbled paper by a good 50 years or so.) You end up learning quite a lot about the history of bookbinding when you work on antiquarian books!

Hello everyone. I live in England and I'm a hobby bookbinder. I've always had a love for old books and handicrafting, so the two fit interests fit together perfectly. I'm lucky enough to live in an area where there are bookbinding classes, so I've been taught by a professional. I especially like working with leather. I'm not sure about uploading pics here, so I've given it a try and you may or may not see a before and after example of what I do! I've seen quite a few posts here about notebook covers, and "designer bindings", but I'm just wondering if there are any other members like me, who collect, repair or rebind old books.

Hi Scott, I've just joined the forums too. Bookbinding is my hobby and I've done some webpages about it which might interest you. They're not intended as tutorials, but there's still quite a lot of detail. One of the reasons I put them together was because, as you say, there doesn't appear to be a lot online. The best site I've come across for detailed information is www.aboutbookbinding.com

Thanks for the compliments everyone. I'm flattered! You're right Kate, Ebay is definitely better for buying than for selling! I'm trying not to go there at the moment as there are way too many interesting books for sale and my willpower is nil. I'm not very good at parting with my books, so when I buy one in need of work, it invariably has a happy retirement on one of my own bookshelves when it's finished. But yes, nicely restored 200 year old books can be quite valuable.

Hello Everyone! I'm intrigued by the number of leathercrafts that are highlighted here and very impressed by the high standard of workmanship. My own speciality is bookbinding, which has been a hobby for many years. As a booklover, it means I can buy tatty copies of books I couldn't afford if they were in good condition, and then repair or rebind them. I especially enjoy working on antiquarian books and many of the books on which I work are over 200 years old. The oldest book in my collection was published in 1607. A few months ago I started to take on paid commissions as I thought it would be neat to make the hobby self financing. So far it's working well, in that I'm not getting so much work it becomes a chore, but there's enough coming in to enable me to buy some of the equipment on my wish list. I live on the north east coast of England.