Creating A Chessboard Inside A Book

I’m Bad At Bookbinding

This was one of the final projects for my Advanced Graphic Communications Class in high school. The goal was to create some kind of product along with all of the advertising for it. I’m not sure if I have any of the graphics for the advertising of it, but this is the product I created, a chess board inside a book. It was inspired by going on a walk with my friend Jame’s one day. I was trying to come up with an idea, we walked down to his neighborhood’s clubhouse and played a few games of chess. Immediately the idea hit me, and the rest is history.

Maybe Plywood Is Too Thick?

A major part of creating a project like this is choosing the right materials. Of course, I didn’t do that. For bookbinding, generally thinner is better. This is true for the spine, and both the leather and backing for the cover. But I wanted my book to be sturdy, I thought! I want the thickest, most durable, and being a high school student, most affordable material I could find. I went to Home Depot with my dad, asked if they had any spare pieces of plywood and was able to take some home for free. Once home I spent about two hours cutting through it with a handsaw.

Of course, I also needed the strongest glue attach these plywood covers on. Having never used it before, I got a bottle of E6000, industrial strength adhesive for joining together metals and plastics, and squeezed some out between the plywood and the leather. Turns out, E6000 is toxic, and I should not have been using it in my kitchen. Lesson learned. Also, using too thick of a layer of it, means it never ever dries. The outside of the glue dries and hardens but the inside stays wet. Welp, now I know. Another feature of this kind of glue, is that it is completely inflexible, meaning it does not allow the spine of the book to bend or flex naturally, making for a very uncomfortable reading experience.

Coffee Stained Pages

All pages were 11x17 sheets of 20lb copy paper folded and stained with instant black coffee. I poured the coffee in old baking pans and let the paper soak for a few minutes. Then, I put the paper in another pan and stuck the paper in the oven on very low heat for about 5 minutes.

I then folded every page with a bone folder and did my best to stitch the pages together in signatures. I’’m very bad at sewing. Once that was done I cut out a section of the pages with a knife and glued in the compartment to hold the chess pieces. After designing the chess board and map in Adobe Illustrator, I was able to print it out in class and glue it into the center of the book.