Repurpose a Hardback Novel

Here's an idea that I scraplifted from a Carol Wingert Creatologie kit that I purchased a few months ago. When I bought the kit, I was a little skeptical, but after completing it, I was wowed (and hooked). I have a ton of old books that my husband has already read that collect dust on shelves. This idea gives those books a new purpose - holding memories!!





To do this, you first have to remove the "guts" from the book without damaging a spine. Carol recommends using a pencil and a craft knife to rip them out - since it works for her, then it works for me! Next you paint the book cover with acrylic paint - I used brown and gave it two coats.



Once dry, flip the book over and, with a glue stick and a brayer, cover the insides with a light weight paper. I used Anna Griffin for my book. I then created three sets of holes with an awl at the same spots at the top one inch down, in the middle and at the bottom one inch up. Those holes are used to sew in the pages - which are grouped into three different signatures.


I used the My Mind's Eye and card stock for the pages. Some of the papers were double sided, some were not. For those pages that weren't double sided I glued them together back to back to create the double sided look. The papers were mostly cut 8 1/2 x 11 and folded in half, placing three sheets togetheron the fold, then pierce the holes for sewing to match the holes you punched in the spine. I couldn't find waxed linen thread anywhere, as Carol recommended to use for the sewing, so I made my own. I used embroidery thread and beeswax that you buy at a quilting shop to wax the thread. To sew the pages in, start at the middle, sew from the inside of the book to the outside, then up to the top hole from out to in. Then pull the thread all the way to the bottom hole, in to out, then back through the middle from out to in. Then tie it off with the tail left from your original stitch. Pretty easy actually (I just hope I explained it well enough to follow).

From here you simply use two more sets of three 8 1/2 x 11 double sided papers folded together to create the other two signatures.
After your get them all sewn in, you decorate however you please.


The hardback book should measure about 6" x 9". To get the spine to look like mine, you gather the three waxed thread strands together on the outside with light florist wire or more waxed thread. Using a two-holed, decorative button (you'll need two), "thread" the wire/thread ends through the button holes. Tie off.
I wish I could take credit for all the clever techniques used to make this project, but all the ideas, for the most part, are from Carol Wingert. Her ideas and projects are just SO inspiring, I can't help but use them sometimes in my own work.