Shoutout to the person who told me to try PVA glue instead of wheat paste for book cloth

I was dead set on using wheat paste for everything because that's what all the old tutorials said. But I kept having issues with my book cloth bubbling up after a few days. A guy at my local bookbinding meetup in Portland told me to switch to PVA for the cloth backing. I thought he was crazy because PVA seemed too modern and stiff. Then I tried it on a rebind of a 1960s encyclopedia last week and the cloth lay flat perfect. No bubbles, no peeling, and it dried way faster than I expected. Has anyone else found that PVA is better for certain materials than the traditional stuff?

2 comments

2 Comments

seanjohnson15d ago

Felt the same way when a buddy convinced me to switch from wheat paste to PVA for cloth backing, thought he was pulling my leg until my book covers stopped looking like topographical maps. Now I'm that guy annoying everyone about PVA at meetups like some kind of glue evangelist. Took me way too long to realize modern adhesives aren't always the enemy of traditional bookbinding.

oscarb7115d agoMost Upvoted

It's funny how that mindset creeps into everything, not just bookbinding. I caught myself gatekeeping cast iron seasoning methods until my buddy showed up with perfectly crispy eggs from a Teflon pan and I realized tradition can sometimes just be stubbornness in disguise.