Realized I was putting my headbands on backwards for a solid year

I was working on a quarter leather binding last week, trying to get the headband to sit right. I kept getting this tiny gap between the band and the spine, no matter how tight I pulled the thread. My mentor, who runs a shop in Tacoma, stopped by and just watched me for a minute. He said, 'You're sewing from the tail to the head, aren't you?' I was. He showed me that starting at the head and working down lets the threads nest better under each turn, closing that gap. I'd been doing it wrong since I learned from a book. The difference on my next book was huge. Has anyone else had a basic step they learned wrong from a text or video?

3 comments

3 Comments

tessa8683mo ago

Books are full of lies, man.

ellis.nina3mo ago

Remember that memoir by James Frey, @tessa868? The one Oprah loved until they found out he made up huge parts of it. That whole mess made me question every "true story" I pick up. Even history books get facts wrong depending on who's writing them. It's not that all books are lies, but you have to wonder what the author left out or changed to make a better story.

phoenixking2mo ago

GASPED out loud when I read that James Frey thing. I had that book on my shelf for years, thought it was this raw, honest look at addiction. Finding out he just made up huge chunks of it felt like a betrayal, honestly. It makes you paranoid about EVERYTHING you read, even the stuff that's supposed to be factual. I've got a copy of a book on bookbinding that has a section that's just factually wrong about some glues, and I wonder how many other people just accepted it as gospel.