Learn how to make your own books from the inventor of the anti-moleskin

John-Paul Flintoff used to sketch in Moleskine booklets, but came to feel increasingly repelled by their machine-made perfection (and ubiquity). So he invented the anti-Moleskine, teaching himself from first principles how to make a books using scrap paper, then gradually getting more ambitious.

He will teach you how to make your own unique book – to consider the size you want, to cut the pages, to stitch them together, and finally to bind them in hard or soft covers using papers, card or fabric, and to design your own endpapers. Unlike the Moleskine, the anti-Moleskine can be entirely your own design – John-Paul will show you how to make fold-out pages and other innovations.

After you have done this, John-Paul will help you to re-cover a book by one of your favourite authors. Before coming to the class, make sure to buy exactly the right novel, or philosophical treatise, or other tome, online. Buy one that is going cheap because the spine is damaged or has even fallen off. Make sure too that the book has been stitch-bound, not cheaply glued. (If you’re unsure, contact the seller.) Bring material with which you wish to re-cover this cherished book—or else choose from the ones they have at the Idler Academy.