I always thought painting the page edges was just a way to make books look pretty on Instagram. Then my buddy Dave showed me his copy of Dune with a deep orange desert gradient that matched the cover. The color actually made the book feel more immersive when I was reading, like the whole object was part of the story. Has anyone else changed their mind on a mod after seeing it in person?
I tried using a glue stick to seal the edges of a paperback before trimming it with a craft knife, and the pages just crumbled everywhere. Switched to PVA glue applied with a sponge brush on my next book, and the cut came out clean and smooth in one pass. Has anyone else found a specific glue or method that works better for trimming page edges?
I used acrylic paint on a hardcover book I found at a thrift store in Seattle last March, and it looked amazing at first. But now the paint is peeling off in chunks, and I think the glue from the original cover binding is reacting with the pigments. Has anyone found a primer or sealer that actually stops this from happening?
I soaked the edges of a cheap paperback in a bowl of strong black tea for 3 hours after watching a tutorial, but now the pages look like they went through a flood. The stain went way deeper than the video showed and the pages stick together near the edges. Anyone else mess up their first attempt at edge staining and have a fix for making it look intentional?
Spent 2 years avoiding it after a failed attempt with a copy of Dune, but last week I did a simple paperback to hardcover conversion and actually used it. Has anyone else found a surprisingly easy entry point into this craft?
Saw a bookbinder on YouTube flip her stack around and suddenly my last 5 rebinds all had wavy pages because I was fighting the paper grain without even knowing it was a thing has anyone else dealt with this or am I the only one who missed that detail?