The latest Psuedo Press newsletter isn’t up on their website yet, but it’s a great installment. I’m really into the whole vibe of Psuedo Press—they offer their monthly newsletter in mailed zine format, they have some of the funkiest (in a good way!) email styling I’ve ever seen, and they pack their newsletter with tips for us wretched who feel compelled to make books. Their latest newsletter includes a discussion of bookbinding thread that gets wonderfully far into the weeds.
My absolute standard for bookbinding is the Fils au Chinois Waxed Linen thread, either the Lin Câblé n°526 or the Lin Retours n°24. The thread company, unfortunately quite orientalist in its brand design, is a French manufacturer from Lille (a historic center of textiles on the continent) and I order it from a haberdashery in Versailles. I’m quite smug about the whole thing, since it all feels kitchy and antiquated, like I’m in a scene from Hobsbawm’s long 19th century, engaging in the bustling raw-goods trade markets of a newly-industrialized Europe.
This kind of winding, chatty, thoughtful writing warms my heart. (Thanks to Xander for turning me on to this one!)
