How to Make Books: Fold, Cut & Stitch Your Way to a One-of-a-Kind Book

Esther K. Smith runs Purgatory Pie Press in New York with letterpress printer Dikko Faust, a studio whose limited-edition artist books are held in permanent collections at MoMA, the Whitney, the National Gallery of Art, and the Tate. How to Make Books distills that practice into an accessible guide for beginners, organized to build skill gradually from simple folded structures requiring nothing more than a single sheet of paper up through accordion books and multisignature bindings including a Coptic-stitch structure achievable without specialized equipment. Thirty projects in total, each illustrated with line drawings and photographs of finished examples from Purgatory Pie Press's own work.

Materials throughout are kept deliberately accessible, ranging from recycled scraps and everyday office supplies to artists' papers and fine leathers for readers who want to go further. The recurring toolkit across most projects, an awl, a curved needle, and waxed thread, keeps the barrier to entry low. Faust's hand-set antique wood type appears in the book's own design, giving the instructional pages a level of craft unusual for a how-to manual. A standard recommendation in bookbinding and paper-arts circles since its publication.