Instructions for Free Miniature Books for Dollhouse Use Plus PSD Templates for making your own!

So, I recently was asked some questions about the Free Printable Miniature Books for Dollhouse Use and Miniature Books Pages, but the person who wrote me had an email address that kept bouncing back the answers. So I thought I would post answers here in case others had the same question, or she returned to those pages.

She asked if I had instructions, so here are some:

The process takes about an hour per book for me, but can move faster by working on several at once. I usually work with scissors and a purple disappearing color paste glue stick. Print the books on regular cheap thin matte copy paper on one of the better quality print settings.

Use the card stock template to cut out the three little pieces of card stock to make the covers stiffer. Thin card stock (like in cheap Dollar Tree 3×5 cards) is best. It also helps to cut about a millimeter or less off outer corners of the card stock front and back cover to round them very slightly.

Leaving a 1-2mm gap between the cardstock covers and spine for flexibility, cover them with the outer cover pieces by pasting them in to the cover with those small gaps. Then fold over the outer corners and paste, then do the top, bottom and sides.

Join the long strips of pages into a longer single strip, fold and glue and flatten, and stick the spine into the cover.  Then trim and put the end papers on to hide any mess and help hold it all together. 

Finally paste on the cover image(s) and spine text. Let dry overnight.

Book by Nicolas Larmessan on Costumes Of The Trades

I like to work on several books in a row while watching TV. It helps to check the books as they dry, to separate any pages that inadvertently start sticking together from an over abundance of paste. If any book comes out too pasty, I usually can save it with a damp (not wet) q-tip and a bit of “massage” of opening and closing.

If you find you like the format, and have a version of Photoshop that allows lots of layers and want to create some of your own, I have the multilayered PSD templates I created on and use to just drop in pictures & text. You can find lots of copyright expired content online that interests you, and with practice insert and download it into the appropriate layout template in about an hour, so you can make custom books on any topic: 

Google Drive: Photoshop Template for Miniature Books: Basic Portrait Layout Book

Google Drive: Photoshop Template for Miniature Books: Basic Long Portrait Layout Book

Google Drive: Photoshop Template for Miniature Books: Basic Landscape Layout Book

Google Drive: Free Miniature books 1-61 as a single downloadable PDF

That way if you are making a miniature library or whole doll house you can populate it with books that make sense for an imaginary household Grandpa with old military memoirs, Grandma with knitting books, Dad with books on sailboats and the Sartorial Art Journal, Mother with some books on interior design and travel, young uncle with western dime novels and porn, Shockheaded Peter and Oz books for the kids, cookbooks in the kitchen, etc.

Or if you are like me, just pick a topic you like and make it all in miniature!

Book on the 17th Century Court Ballet costumes of Daniel Rabel

4 thoughts on “Instructions for Free Miniature Books for Dollhouse Use Plus PSD Templates for making your own!”

  1. Thanks!
    Computers can be so techy, our laptop will bounce back emails from websites for no reason. Very frustrating.

  2. The link for the “Photoshop Template for Miniature Books: Basic Portrait Layout Book” is not a ,psd file. Apart from that little hiccup, thank you for the other .psd files and the instructions. I have enjoyed looking through your 61 mini books. I am so looking forward to making some of my own.

Comments are closed.