Historic book reproduction

I do collect antique books, but using the really old ones at a larp would be a matter of negligence, so I reproduce some works to add to my characters' libraries. In the case of scanned books, the process is simple: digitally retouch and clean the pages, print them on nice paper, bind them. Making a nice cover is the hardest thing, because even though books were bound in all manners, from leather with gold print to plain paper covers titled with ink, I as a perfectionist want to have as many reproductions as possible and in as nice a shape as possible.

Two of my first repros were Couperin's treatise "L'Art de Toucher le Clavecin" (1716) and de Lauze's "Apologie de la Danse" (1623).

Usually I bind them in coloured paper, using mute colours like browns, greys or dark greens, doing the spine and the corners in slightly contrasting colours. Tags with author and title are usually just added to the spine, I've never seen any original that has a title at the front. There also exist copies where the title is written directly onto the paper of the binding, not bothering to glue on an extra tag.

If you want, however, to bind the book in leather, make sure you use the thinnest, softest leather available. Glove-thin leather is just fine, a bit stronger still gives good results, and it should never be suede.

For the first cover of leather-bound reproductions I chose George Silver's "Paradoxes of Defence" (1599), brown pre-embossed leather, fleur-de-lys end-paper and, not necessarily authentic, metal corners. As my baroque character is not a novice with the sword, this would be one of the most-used books in her library, so better make it sturdy.

When I do half-linen covers I sometimes don't bother to join front, spine and back with a strip of paper before putting on the linen, but with paper-only or leather it's advisable, as paper isn't stable enough and leather rather flexible. So join the three parts of cardboard before you glue them to the leather. Before you fold in the edges you have to thin out the leather to get a smooth transition beneath the end paper, otherwise you'll have a bump beneath it where the leather ends. Cut or scrape with a very sharp blade (razor would be better) at an angle until you've thinned the cover all around.

Then glue all edges up. The corners cannot be folded like you would with paper or linen. Fold them and cut them well along the line where they meet.

Fold up and pinch slightly together

Cut along the line; still a bit too pointy here

Point removed, ready for finishing

Draw the corner endges firmly together with a folding bone and smooth them exactly edge to edge. There should be no glimpse of cardboard visible between them. Leather is very pliable, just force it to do your bidding. Deto the topmost corner tip. Smooth it down between the edges to form a nicely rounded corner. Press until dry, then attach the body as usual.

Next step: embossing the cover myself. Punches are already ordered...