As I develop my skills as a bookbinder, my goal is to learn more and more stitches for binding books. I have seen fellow bookbinders’ videos with various stitches, but they do not always include the names for these stitches. So I have to go out and literally type “Long stitch on spine..” to try to find a picture that matches what I am looking for, and hopefully a tutorial.
My latest search was “Stitches around the spine..” and that did not immediately give me results, so I had to dig deep to find what I was looking for. Here are some of the most common bookbinding stitches and their tutorials.
Coptic Stitch: This is the most common, and there are loads of videos on how to do Coptic Stitch Binding. I teach a workshop on this stitch and hope to upload a video soon of my own.
Long-Stitch There are so many variations of the long-stitch, and it looks amazing once completed. I often see long-stitch used with leather but you can also use it with other types of material. I received a bunch of leather scraps as a Christmas/Hanukkah gift. It is on my to-do list to attempt to create a leather long-stitch journal.
Button-Hole Stitch: This stitch took me forever to locate. Largely because I kept typing “Stitch with hole in spine or No spine bookbinding”. I eventually found it after searching for a long time, and it's called the Button-Hole Stitch. I don’t quite see how it is a button-hole, but it is what it is. I attempted this stitch using basic cardstock paper and printer paper; however, it was so thin and wobbly that I kept slipping up the binding. I am going to make another attempt, with firmer material.
The French Stitch: I kept seeing bookbinders use this stitch a lot and this one was easier to find so I didn’t have to do any crazy google searches. It's a simple stitch like the Coptic Stitch but it requires a criss cross. I see it often used with text blocks and I wonder if it's because you move pretty quickly with it compared to other stitches. It looks nice, and it's pretty simple to learn.
Japanese Stab Binding: I love that this stitch is super easy to learn and complete but getting the holes punched is a beast. You should probably use a Japanese Hole Puncher to make holes, but I do not have one (it's on my list of items to get) so I used a drill. The hole needs to be a decent size so you can push the needle through all the pages of paper. This stitch allows you to bind single sheets and all at once. Typically, Japanese Stab Binding has journals that are landscape in size and look amazing. Just make sure you can get good holes for the needles.
The Secret Belgian Stitch: It's so hard to find, it's a secret… It’s not that big of a secret but when you are new to bookbinding it is to you. I have seen this binding a lot and I love the way it looks but I didn’t know what it was called. So I went to my handy dandy Google and searched “external spine” Nothing… and then I searched “binding around the spine” that one actually got me closer than I thought. I finally kept searching through pictures and found The Secret Belgian Stitch.
If you haven't noticed by now, I'm a huge fan of SeaLemon bookbinding videos. They are clear, concise and always provides the resources she uses. Once I know the names of these various stitches, I'm able to quickly search through all her videos and find what I need. I highly recommend looking at her beginning videos if you are interested in bookbinding.