Books by Hand photo album kits

While cleaning up my studio, I ran into two Books by Hand photo albums kits (1 Ribbon-bound Photo Album and 1 Post-bound Photo Album).  I bought them several years ago when I first began learning about book making.  Since I have been making more book board books recently I thought it was a good time to use them.  Both are “Just-the-pieces” kits.  Meaning they included instructions; cut, punched and scored pieces of book board and pages.  They do not include book cloth or decorative paper.  This gave me an opportunity to use some of the marbled paper and book cloth I already have.  I liked how the photo albums turned out.  The directions were clear , and having the pre-cut book board and pages made it a fun quick project.

I constructed the Ribbon-bound Photo Album first, then the Post-bound Photo Album.  Most of the steps are similar.  

For the ribbon bound photo album:

1. I cut pieces of book cloth for the spine, marbled paper for the front and back outside covers, and decorative papers for the inside front and back covers.
2. The 24 album pages were already punched and scored.  They needed to be folded and glued up to create the block.
3. Book cloth was glued to the outside of the book board front hinge and cover.  
4. Then the marbled paper was glued to the outside of the front cover.  
5. Following the kit’s directions, decorative paper is glued to the inside of the front cover.  
6. Steps 3 through 5 are repeated for the back cover.  
   
   
   
7. The block is then glued to the front and back covers and pressed.  
8. Finally, ribbon is woven through the binding of the spine.

Finished back of ribbon bound photo album

For the post bound photo album:

Steps 1 through 4 are the same.  Step 5 is slightly different.  Following the kit’s directions, book cloth and decorative paper are glued to the inside of the front cover.  This process was repeated for the back cover.

The block is then attached to the front and back covers using the provided metal screw posts.

inside front cover showing post attachment

Finished front of post bound photo album