Little Altered Box

The Beach 

by Alfred Victor Fournier,  1872-1924

A child asked me to make a drawing book, and so I looked into my collection of empty boxes and found this. Sometimes friends give me interesting boxes, as I often buy in bulk and don't get the packaging, so you see below the box I have acquired. A fruit pectin box will work, as well.

After cutting the flaps off both ends of this box, cut out one of the narrow ends and open it up so that it looks like a book.

Slide the hand-held hole puncher as far as it will go on each end of the "spine" and punch a hole.

Trace the box on whatever paper you choose by rolling it along the paper folded up and tracing each side. The paper cover will not fit the box if you trace the box when it is flat, because there is extra space on the folded edges.

Cut about a half inch larger around the traced box so that the edges can be folded over, as you will see later.  Swirl glue all over it. The glue sticks work best, as the white liquid glue is too wet and makes it wrinkle.

For end-papers on the inside, trace the box flat and cut about a fourth inch shorter all around. 

Trace on paper of your choice for the inside pages of the book. 12 pages ought to do, but you can make less. Then stack them and cut about half inch smaller all around. Center the papers and lay the box on top to punch new holes through the already punched holes.

Fold the edges in and glue down, and then paste the end paper over, trimming it shorter if necessary.  Re-punch the holes through the paper, with the original holes as the guide.

Assemble the pages inside the book, centering them and punching the holes, using the holes in the book back as a guide. Twist one end of wired ribbon and bring it up from the back of the book to the inside, and into the other hole to the back of the book again. I would recommend using wired ribbon from dollar stores instead of fabric stores.  Trim the pages if they are larger than the book cover.

Form the ribbon into a bow on the outside along the spine of the book.

Depending on what kind of pattern is on the outside cover, you can decorate it  with stickers or clip art to match. This was plain white construction paper so I added paper and cloth butterflies.

Now you have a little book to draw in, and this is what

the inside looks like with the end papers.

Now that you see how this was done, you might find yourself looking at throw-away boxes a little differently, imagining which way to turn it to make a book.