The Red Book Of Westmarch

[Steve Musgrave]

Hello all.

At heart, I am a huge geek. And thus, I play a good amount of Dungeons and Dragons. I had an idea today to create a three-ring binder for my D&D stuff based on the Red Book of Westmarch from the Lord of the Rings. That said, I'm a little confused on how to do it. I've read some tutorials but for whatever reason the specifics are escaping my noobie-leatherworker head.

Essentially, it would be a slightly floppy leather bound folder that would hold plastic sheets in a three ring binder. But I'm not sure of the best way to construct it (what leather thickness, how to attach the three ring clip bit, etc.)

If anyone could help, I would greatly appreciate it. I'm new to this and the construction aspect is still taking some time to wrap my head around.

Thank you!!

[camano ridge]

If you want a slight flex but not paper floppiness. Use 9 - 10 oz leather. If your paper is 8 1/2 x 11 find the size of the holders you would be using and figure your leather to be a 1/4" inch or so larger ( I would do it 1/4" larger both to and bottom. Figure the width of your bindeer metal. So essentially let say the leather would be 9" 1/2" high to accomodate the height of the sheet holders then 12" for both fron and back figure 2 - 2 1/" binder backing so lets say the leather woould be 26 1/2" long and 9 1/2" to 10" high. lay the leather out measure 12 " from each side edge and gouge a creas this will give you your 2 1/2" binder space. Center binder metal and rivet the binder metal in place. If you are going to tool a design, do it before placing the binder metal. For a more rustic look flip the leather so the rough out side is the face of the binder and gouge the smooth side. Then burn or brand any design into the rough out. Either way once you have the binder metal in place wet the gouged creases and fold the sides to form you binder. THis is a very simplistic method. You can get as fancy as you want, you can use double thicknes of leather ( your choice of thickness) glued together and stitched or you canb lace or braid the edges etc. There are refinments that can be made such as burnishing the edges, dying etc.

SPringfield leather has the three ring binder metal 8 1/2" long for $3.49 http://springfieldleather.com/19537/Binder%2CMetal%2C3-Ring-8-1-2%22/

Hope this gets your creative juices flowing in the right direction. I am sure others will have some sugestions and different ways of doing it.

[Steve Musgrave]

Definitely! Thanks for your suggestions and the link. That helps a ton.

[raysouth]

Hello Steve,

Another way I have seen this done, is a very thin plastic binder is used as a base and then covered with leather of your choice. You can use nearly any thickness/weight leather you desire and tool or burn your designs as you wish them to appear, naturally done before adhering to the binder.

The last binder I saw was very flexible, using this method with lightweight veg tan and was beautifully carved.

Saves the problem of attachment for the binder ring strip and makes a nice binder cover as well.

Hope this helps.

God Bless.

Ray

[MTH]

Steve ~

What kind of design are you thinking for the cover? The same as the classic Red Book cover?Or something of your own?

Are you going to stamp the leather?

Whatever way you plan to attack this encounter, it's highly unlikely that'll you'll roll a 20 on the first swing, you should really consider spending some skill points err I mean practice on some scrap first.

Keep this thread going. I'd love to see how this progresses.

Edited August 25, 2013 by MTH