That tip about endpaper grain direction I overheard at a Portland workshop

I was at a repair workshop last month in Portland and a binder named Kate mentioned she always checks grain direction on endpapers before gluing. She said if the grain runs crosswise, books can warp or crack after a year or two. Has anyone else run into problems from ignoring grain direction on their endpapers?

2 comments

2 Comments

singh.wren15d agoMost Upvoted

That's a solid tip from Kate, and she's right about the warping issue. One thing I'd gently push back on though: it's not just about endpapers. The real problem comes when you glue an endpaper that runs crosswise to the text block's grain. Even if your endpaper grain is oriented correctly for the cover boards, if it fights the book's natural grain direction you get that same cupping and cracking over time. I had a stack of journals I bound in 2020 that still show a slight bow because I matched the endpaper grain to the boards but forgot to check it against the signatures. Made a mess of about 15 books before I figured it out. Have you seen Kate's method for testing grain direction on lightweight endpapers?

jakem9815d ago

Huh, I'm not totally convinced this is as big of a deal as people make it out to be. I've definitely thrown together books where the endpaper grain was wrong and they're still sitting flat on my shelf after a few years. Maybe it matters more for specific projects, but I feel like a lot of binders overthink this one.