Antique Embroidered Book

If you haven’t yet taken a peek at the new Dark Fairytale series, you’re in for a treat! (Or at least, we like to think so) Crafters in general seem to love their myth, lore, and legend, and also seem to share a love of books. And who doesn’t love books?

Though, I will be honest, every time I go into a used bookstore I’m secretly hoping to come across a copy of the Necronomicon with an old, tattered leather cover with intricate engravings and spooky designs. I usually leave with a beat-up copy of a mystery novel. Nice, but never quite what I’m after.

Part of the beauty in some books is simply how they look, and if we can’t find them that way, we’ll make 'em! It’s a perfect and unusual way to display your favorite literary embroidery designs and give your book a little more character.

To make your antique embroidered book, you’ll need:

• A hardcover book (decide now if it’s just for decoration, or if you want to be able to read it after we’re done)
• Vintage looking fabric (I love linens)
• A container for hot water
• Some tea
• Mod Podge
• Brush and/or sponge applicator
• Scissors

Depending on how you want to finish your book, you may need a few extra supplies, but we’ll get to that at the end.

First, start with your fabric. Lay out a square about 2 1/2 inches larger than your book. Measure out a rectangle that’s more than twice as long, and has at least 2 inches all the way around the book for folding and gluing. It’s always better to cut more than you need rather than less. Make sure also that if you're embroidering and happen to be covering a tiny book, you leave enough fabric to hoop.

If you're adding embroidery (because machine embroidery is awesome) -

Hoop the right side of your fabric, where the cover of the book is going to be. Remember not to hoop it too close to the right edge, since you need a lot of that room to fold and glue onto the cover. Hoop your design up with regular cut away stabilizer, and stitch away.

Wrap your book up with the design on the cover (if there is one), and trim off any excess fabric you won’t need. Remember, keep at least two inches all the way around your book!

Note to machine embroiderers - now is a good time to cut your stabilizer to size. I’d trim it so it’s exactly the same size as your book cover. That way it won’t show through, even on light fabrics.

Tea time! Well, not to drink. Unless you really fancy a strong cup of tea...

Boil up some water and pour it into your container with 2-3 teabags. How dark you want your stain to be will depend upon how many tea bags you add, and how long you let it steep. This is a pretty strong cuppa.

Soak your fabric in your tea. Leave it in only a few seconds if you want a really light stain, longer for deeper, richer colors. Tea will of course show up a lot darker on light fabrics.  When it’s ready, remove your fabric from the tea, wring it out, and lay it flat to dry.

Once your fabric is dry, you’re probably going to want to give it a good ironing, as smooth fabric is a lot easier to adhere to a book.

Wrap your book up in your fabric again, carefully centering your design on the cover. Taking care not to shift the placement of the fabric, open it up to the wrong side, and mark the edges of the spine on both the top and bottom of your book.

Grab your scissors and snip these marks just shy of where the book begins. Fold these flaps inwards. This part of the book we can’t glue inside the spine, so we’re folding them in so they look like the rest of the cover.

Once your book is ready, give the cover a nice coating of Mod Podge to get it sticky. Center your design on the cover, and give it a light coating of Mod Podge as well. Now here comes the messy part...

You can use a brush if you just got a manicure, but I like using my fingers to smooth the sticky fabric to the cover. You’ll get a smoother, tighter fit. Smooth the fabric outwards, working towards the edges, pulling everything as snug as it will go. When you get to the edge, give the inside edge a one inch coating of glue, and then pull and smooth your fabric edge over it. Once it’s smoothed in place, add more Mod Podge on top and smooth it down with a brush or your fingers to get it really flush with the cover.

Once you’ve folded in the side, fold in the top and bottom the same way, snipping off any excess at the corners that doesn't want to lay flat. 

A tip! If you’re planning on being able to open this book later, get a piece of scrap paper and place it on top of the front page. This will stop the cover from sticking to the first page as you’re waiting for everything to dry. Once the front is done, repeat this process at the back, pulling nice and tight to make sure everything is staying all snug.

Technically, you can be done now, if you want a lightly tea stained book. If you’re looking for something a little more worn and grungy, continue on for that truly special used book effect... 

To make your book look even more ancient, grab your brush and dip it back into the tea again. Wipe off most of the excess tea from the brush, and then gently “dry brush” just around the edges of the book, where it’s most likely to pick up dirt over time. If you want a less harsh edge, dampen the edges first with a paper towel. This will allow your tea stain to bleed a bit.

We have two different finishing phases, and these depend on whether you want your book to be a purely decorative and awesome way to display your embroidery, or if you want this to be a book cover on a book you’d like to still be able to read and cherish.

For a readable book-

Cut a piece of paper just a little bit smaller than your inside cover, and glue it over the raw edges of your fabric on the inside of the book. This will make it look polished inside and out! Make sure you do this on the back cover too. Your book is beautiful, and readable! It’s got a fancy new cover but you can still enjoy diving into your favorite dark stories.

For a decorative book-

Add some generous glue to the inside of the cover, and close your book, effectively gluing the cover shut (I realize the rest of the pages will still open, we’ll get to that). Do this for the back cover too. Now, to really give it that gilded, antique look, with your book closed, carefully paint the side of the pages with your gold or metallic paint. This mimics fancy books of old, and gives your book that special, decorative touch. Plus, the paint on the side will basically glue all your pages shut, so what you have now is a really cool way to display your cover design.

So, you can either keep it light and basic, with just some minor tea staining for a beautifully worn look... or you can distress the edges, stain it darker, and take it all the way to beautiful prop and embroidery display. Either way it’s going to look pretty cool on your shelf.

Could you imagine a whole row of these? I totally can.