Secret Belgian Bindings

I’ve been so busy getting the Handmade Book Club off the ground that I haven’t posted any of my work for a while. Two books that I’ve enjoyed making are these Secret Belgian Bindings with beautiful hand marbled paper by Claire Guillot on their covers.

Anne Goy created this structure in 1986 and called it the “Crisscross” binding. The book was given the name Secret Belgian Binding by Hedi Kyle because she didn’t know the name of the originator but she didn’t want to claim it as her structure. All she knew was that it originated in Belgium, hence the nickname Secret Belgian Binding, which seems to have stuck.

I used book cloth on both spines because I find that the thread grips the fabric more firmly than a paper spine. The top book uses a Duo Book Cloth from Colophon Book Arts and the second book’s spine is covered in a book cloth that I made from silk. If you want to make your own book cloth, check out this tutorial.

If you want to see me sewing this book, check out this sped up video on Instagram.