Although e-books are becoming more popular every day, their traditional paper relatives do not give up their positions. However, most publishers understand that, due to their high cost, printed paper literature is significantly inferior to electronic versions. For this reason, printing and book binding technologies are constantly being improved. So, one of the latest innovations in this area is integrated binding. What is it and what are its advantages over other ways of designing books? Let's find out.
What is book binding
To better understand the uniqueness of the integrated method of interweaving printed products, it is worthwhile to understand what binding is and why it is needed.
As you know, a book (in its modern form) consists of many paper pages bound together. Framed by their book binding, which is sometimes also called the cover, although this is not quite the same thing. This device serves not only to fasten pages, but also to protect them from damage, as well as to inform about the contents of the publication.
Sometimes the word “cover” also refers to the process of creating a cover. However, in this meaning it is more correct to use a different name. This is a "bookbinding business."
The history of book binding
The exact date of the appearance of the tradition of using bindings for books is not known. Scientists believe that this happened in the 2nd century BC. e. However, it took another two centuries to improve the binding, making it look like modern.
Initially, its main function was to bind and protect the pages of the book from damage. For this reason, bindings were made from strong, hard materials like wood or leather. In the same period, a tradition arose to decorate books with precious metals and stones, which made them very expensive and inaccessible to most.
With the invention of printing, manufacturers of printed matter began to look for ways to speed up and reduce the cost of the binding process. In this regard, leather-bound books have been supplanted by cardboard and fabric counterparts over several centuries. After that, they ceased to be a rarity, and their covers began to fulfill not only a protective function, but also an informative one. They began to write information on the title and author of the work, as well as on the publisher, less often - on the owner.
Since the 18th century, fashion has been spread among wealthy people around the world to compile their own libraries. In this regard, for each owner of such a "collection" a unique binding design was developed, often using the coat of arms.
The quality and luxury of the decoration of books now depended on the financial capabilities of their owner. For example, Pushkin was not rich, so the design of bindings in his library was very modest, but he was distinguished by durability. At the same time, many landowners in the Russian Empire, who collected books only for the sake of fashion, saved on the quality of binders for the sake of appearance.
In the XX century, with the development of industry, all stages of the production of printed products were automated, and human participation in this process was minimized. Moreover, with the advent of the soft paper cover, leather-bound books became the lot of history. Although today you can order this design for a gift edition, made by the master manually. However, it will cost, as in old times, very expensive.
What is a book cover and how does it differ from binding
Often the cover is equated by the semantic meaning with the word “binding”, and although both of these terms mean the outer cover of the book, there is a certain difference between them. What does it consist of? Let's find out.
The cover refers to the paper or cardboard outer cover of a book, notebook, diary or any document. At the same time, binding is almost always made from more dense types of cardboard, covered with paper, film, fabric or other materials.
Structurally, these two concepts also differ from each other. So, there are no bookends in the cover and, as a rule, it represents a solid-cut part. While the traditional binding for a book may consist of several parts glued together. There is also a one-piece version of it - integral binding.
Due to the prevalence of paperback publications, it is often confused with binding. Such publications can be distinguished by the presence of the flyleaf. If it is, these are paperback books. If there is no bookend, this is a binding edition.
What the binding consists of
The traditional binding for any publication consists of several elements. First of all, it is a binding cover. In fact, this is the same as the cardboard cover. It serves as the main protective cover for the entire book. This detail is found in two types: composite and one-piece.
The classic composite cover is made of cardboard parts glued with fabric, colored cardboard or plastic, less often faux leather. It contains three details: two sides and a gap (a strip of cardboard covering the place of fastening the pages of the book - the spine). The deepening between the sides and the gap is called the scar.
In the all-cut version, all this makes up one part.
Regardless of its appearance, the cover is attached to the book block (pages collected in a notebook) using bookends.
The remaining three sides of the book, not fastened together, are called trimmings: front, top and bottom.
The ribbon bookmark glued to the binding is called a lassie.
What materials are used for binding covers?
After the tree was no longer used in book production, for many centuries the cover for binding was made of cardboard of different thicknesses.
However, since the second half of the 20th century, plastic began to compete with cardboard. Covers for binding from this material are more reliable and are not afraid of moisture. Today they are quite often used in the printing industry. By the way, one of the main advantages of plastic over cardboard is that covers of this kind can be not only any color, but also transparent. Moreover, this innovation has a tangible drawback. The fact is that plastic covers can be harmful to the environment, since this material itself does not decompose and needs to be recycled.
The tendency to use plastic for book binding is more concerned not with fiction or gift editions, but with the production of bookbindings for notebooks, diaries, notebooks, abstracts, theses and reference books.
It is also worth noting the growing trend of making notebook covers and notebooks made of silicone.
Hardcover and its subspecies
It is widely known that there are such types of bindings: hard, soft and integral. Moreover, each of them has its own subspecies.
Depending on the coating of the cardboard base of the hardcover cover, there are such options.
- 7BC (cellophane) - the cover is glued with sealed laminated or varnished paper.
- 7T - cardboard covered with fabric. It can be sealed, varnished, dyed or embossed.
- 7B - according to the processing method, this subspecies is similar to 7T. However, in this case, the lid is not fitted with fabric, but with various materials similar to artificial or genuine leather, bumvinil, balacron, etc.
KBS and ShKS
Considering what types of bindings are common in the modern printing world, it is worth paying attention to subspecies of soft binding. There are two of them.
- KBS - adhesive bonding seamlessly. Unlike hardcover, in this version the pages are not stitched, but only glued together. The cover is made of sealed and laminated whole-cut sheet of paper or cardboard with a density of not more than 300 g / m 2 . A similar method is the cheapest and easiest to implement. At the same time, editions in such a binding can quickly break, because KBS is not very reliable.
- ShKS - sewing adhesive bonding. This method differs from KBS only in that the pages of the book block are not only glued together, but also stitched. The binding cover is made in the same way as with the KBS. Books made with the help of ShBK serve much longer than KBS, however, they are more expensive.
Which binding is called Dutch
In recent years, integral binding has become particularly popular. Sometimes it is also called "Dutch". It is an intermediate link between soft and hard.
Its peculiarity is that with this design of the publication, the cover is made of a one-piece piece of laminated cardboard with a density of up to 500 g / m 2 . Due to this production method, this type simultaneously has the properties of both hard and soft bindings.
Features of the integrated way of book cover design
What are the special properties of the Dutch binding?
First of all, its production is cheaper and faster. Unlike hardcover (for which you have to do several cutting and gluing operations), making an integral book cover is easier. It is cut from a single piece of laminated cardboard, which is scored in the places of folding and does not need additional processing. This Dutch binding looks like soft.
However, unlike him, the cover of the integral form is very dense and does not look very different from the hard one. At the same time, it is lighter (by weight) and less durable, but still surpasses soft SHKS in reliability.
Reliability, cheapness and ease of this way of designing the cover of publications allowed him to become one of the most popular in the world in a few years. In this regard, in some countries there is a tradition of printing school books not in hard, but in integral binding. Thus, the weight of the books that schoolchildren carry in their briefcase has significantly decreased, as has the load on the spine of the child.
Channel binding
In addition to the three most well-known methods of book cover design today, there are several intermediate techniques that appeared only at the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st centuries.
First of all, this is channel binding. Pages in this case do not stitch, do not stick together and do not perforate. On a special machine, they are fastened to the cover and to each other with the help of a U-shaped metal channel.
Thus, it is possible to bind paper with both a hard and a soft or plastic cover.
Books and notebooks with plastic and metal springs
Among the cheapest and most popular ways to weave books is spring binding. It can be metal or plastic. The publication, designed in this way, has no spine - its place is taken by a spring, which is stretched through the perforation in the pages. For such an interweaving, a special machine is needed that makes holes and flashes them.
In this way, most often draw up directories and guides.
Metal Staple Brochure
If the book is small in size and size, it is bound with the usual paper or cardboard cover (without flyleaf). As a rule, such publications are fastened with two brackets, very similar to office ones. This is the cheapest and most affordable way to bind books, although it is suitable only for products of small volumes.