As much as I enjoy working with Japanese papers, when it comes to the books I use at work I like a workhorse — something I can toss in my backpack without worrying about it. I like a paper with a good tooth; a spine I can open wide (if not flat); and not too many pages, because I like to use one book per project.

For this set I used slate-colored Iris bookcloth I purchased ages ago from Talas, both for the covers and for the paste-down inside. The paper is Mohawk Superfine, and in a soft white eggshell finish around 118gsm. I only had 10 sheets so each book has 5 sections with 4 folios each, for 80 pages; each book is around 6-1/4″ wide by 9-3/4″ high.

I remember now that I had bought more than usual of the bookcloth with the idea of Gocco-ing or block printing something on the covers. For this batch I’m happy with the pristine gray, but I might experiment more with that idea later.