Stab Stitched Notebook

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The easiest book binding method in the world!
This is a tutorial for my currently favorite book making method. A Japanese style stab stitching cook, it's perfect for making small notebooks, sketchbooks and albums, as well as bigger hard cover books (though I personally haven't tried those.

The benefits of stab stitching books are - since all the pages are stitched together, there are no signatures and so you can bind any number of pages together. Also, there is no glue involve which make this craft a lot less messy (though you won't be able to judge that by how the studio looks right now).

Posted by aya R. from Brooklyn, New York, United States • Published 21st February 2008 • See aya R.'s 17 projects »

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Step 1
Materials, from left top:

rubber mallet or a hammer
2 pieces of patterned paper cut to size
20-30 pieces of plain paper cut to size
awl
ruler
craft or Exacto knife
pencil
floss
needle
clips
Step 2
Attach all the pages together using the clips, put the clips in about a third from the top, leave at least 1"-2" clear to work on.
Step 3
with the ruler and the pencil, mark a straight line on the top part of the book (where the stitching will go). Mark 5 points in equal intervals.
Step 4
Using the awl and mallet, puncture 5 holes where you made the marking. make sure the awl made it all the way through all layers of paper and that the holes are nice and even. If you down have an awl, this can also be done with a nail.
Step 5
make a knot at the end of your floss and thread it through a needle. Start by passing the needle through the center hole from the back of the book to the front, then loop around the top part of the book and insert the needle again through the same hole.
Step 6
Then, pass the needle through the hole to the right of the center hole, and loop around the top part again. turn the book to the back part and move to the next hole to the right (the last one) and loop around it as well. Loop around the side of the book and insert the needle through the first hole to the right again. Then stitched back to the center.
Step 7
Repeat step 6 to the left side of the book, then tie a knot at the end and trim the floss.
Step 8
Ta-Da! the book is done, you can decorate it with rubber stamps, bits of paper, beads, drawings or whatever you like. Or, if you are too lazy, you can hop on to my store and buy one. Writing the instruction is honestly more complicated then actually making one, there are very few options to where the needle can go and it's really really easy to make.

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Comments

Courtney B. 8th March 2011

One thing you didn't mention is that you will want to wax your thread. It will keep the thread from ripping out of your book.

Cat Morley · London, GB · 1398 projects 5th March 2008

Thanks for the how-to, I have some fabric I want to try this with.

aya R. · Brooklyn, New York, US · 17 projects 23rd February 2008

Methatsall - it depends on how rigid it is. If it's a very hard one, you might have a problem opening it, to overcome that it might be a good idea to make the fold with a folder or part cut.

Good idea - I might try it later this week and make another tutorial for that!