How To Make a Recycled Envelope Book with Scrapbook Paper Instead of Envelopes.

I remembered seeing an envelope book and thought I could use some more scrapbook paper to make something similar. I chose a tropical theme and will use it for my next vacation.

I grabbed a book from the stack that I'm donating to the library and carefully cut the book free from the cover with a razor blade. I'm keeping the pages since I plan to incorporate them into the finished book later.

I measured the spine to see how big to make the insert. This book is 1.25 inches wide.

Now for the math.

I want the insert to be a little smaller than the spine so that it can lay normally when the pages are filled and the "envelopes" are filled. My spine is 1.25" wide so a 1" wide insert will fit well.

I want a 1/2" flange so the larger piece of paper is 2" x 8.75 (the length of the page I want the finished book to have minus .25")

I want to have a .25" space between the flanges so the next 2 pieces of paper are 1.5" wide.

The fold lines are indicated with a dashed line. A scoring board is very helpful but not required.

The center flange is glued together inside. I used Tacky glue since that was what I had on hand and a glue stick would be strong enough.

All 3 folded flanges nest inside each other and are glued along the bottom.

I used scrapbook card stock to make the spine flange.

The book spine isn't stable enough to glue the spine flange to, so I cut a piece of cardboard to size and glued it in place.

I glued on new endpapers to cover the existing ones and cover the cardboard covered spine. I used white scrapbook paper and since the book is wider than 12" I have a seam in the center.

Make sure you fold the book closed to ensure you don't have the paper glued too tight.

I plan to decorate the endpapers with art so the white will suit my  needs but a more interesting end paper would be fun.

Glue the center flange in place.

My finished envelope pages will be 5.5 x 9 inches. Scrapbook paper is only 12" so I needed to piece the envelope sleeve.

I cut the sleeve 5.5 x 9.5 and folded each piece .5 inch on opposite ends.

Glue the 2 pieces of paper together with the folds on opposite sides to reduce bulk at the seam.

Put glue on both sides of each individual flange and slide the envelope sleeve on. Press in place. Check the pages by turning them (like you were reading a book) since they need to have a little space for turning and you don't want the pages too tight.

The finished book. I'll be cutting watercolor paper to size so I can use to as a travel journal. The nice thing is the scrapbook pages are acid free so it won't hurt the artwork.