How to Make Zippered Book Sleeves

Welcome to day 2 of the Holiday Gifts to You blog hop! We’ve planned a solid week of complimentary patterns and tutorials for quick projects. Today I’ll be sharing a tutorial for making book sleeves!

A book sleeve is essentially a padded pouch to protect your book. I don’t know about you, but my books always seem to get a little bit worn when I take them places. No matter how careful I am, putting a book in my bag always leads to scuffs and bent corners. Book sleeves solve that problem!

When I learned about book sleeves earlier this year, I was immediately intrigued. I wanted to make them with my own fabrics, so I set off to find a pattern or tutorial. But everything I found left the top of the pouch wide open. That means the top of the book can still get damaged, and if you have little ones around, it’s still vulnerable to crumbs and spills.

I really wanted my whole book to be protected, so I set about designing my own book sleeves with zippers. Fun Fact - I’d actually never sewn a zipper before this project. I was pleased to discover that they’re not nearly as scary as I thought they were. If you also avoid zippers, I have some great tips to make them easier. I hope you’ll give this project a try!

Sizes

Since books come in a wide array of sizes, I’ve included instructions for small, medium, and large sleeves.

Small book sleeves finish at 7 3/4” by 10 1/4”. They’re perfect for traditional paperbacks and particularly small hardcovers.

Medium book sleeves finish at 8 3/4” by 10 3/4”. They’re great for large paperbacks and average hardcovers.

Large book sleeves finish at 10” by 12 1/4”. These are excellent for big hardcovers. Just to be sure, I tried using one with my partner’s 1015 page hardcover copy of A Dance with Dragons. It easily fit.

Supplies

Tools

In addition to your standard sewing tools, it’s helpful to have:

  • Scissors that aren’t reserved for fabric (for cutting through the zipper)

  • Sewing clips

  • Chopstick or other tool for turning out the corners

  • Zipper foot or somewhat narrow pressing foot (optional)

Cutting

The size you cut depends on the size of book sleeve you want to make. You will need two pieces each of Bosal In-R-Form, outside fabric, and lining fabric:

  • Small — 8 1/2” by 11”

  • Medium — 9 1/2” by 11 1/2”

  • Large — 10 3/4” by 13”

Fusing

When you pull out your Bosal In-R-Form, you’ll notice that one side is soft like flannel, while the other side is textured and a little bit shiny. The rougher shiny side is the fusible side.

Fuse the wrong side of the outside fabric to the Bosal In-R-Form. I used the cotton setting on my iron. I also found that the In-R-Form held up well to a tiny spritz of water from my misting bottle.

Let’s call these the outside panels.

Inserting Zipper

We will start by layering one outside panel right side up, the zipper with the teeth facing down, and a lining piece right side down. This picture is to show you how everything will go together, but we’re not quite ready to sew yet. First, we need to pull out our 1/4” wash away wonder tape.

I love the 1/4” wash away wonder tape because it holds everything firmly in place while I’m sewing. And since it’s smaller than my seam allowance, I never see it in my finished project!

To use the wonder tape:

  1. Stick a strip along the very top edge of the outside panel. I tear this rather than cutting it because it makes the next step easier.

  2. Peel the protector off of the top of the wonder tape.
    Note - If the whole tape is coming up, you can briefly hit it with the iron. Just avoid the ends, or it becomes very difficult to start separating the protector from the tape.

  3. Line up the edge of the zipper tape with the top of the outside panel.
    Important - Notice that the zipper head is hanging past the outside panel. This makes sewing the zipper so much easier because you don’t have to navigate around the head! You want to give yourself about an inch between the zipper head and the outside panel. And more space is great if you have extra zipper length.

  4. Heat set with an iron.

Don’t have wonder tape? I’ve also heard that a standard washable glue stick works well. I haven’t personally tried that, though.

Following the same process, use another strip of wonder tape to secure the lining fabric to the zipper. Make sure the lining is right side down and that it’s perfectly aligned with the outside panel.

Sew along the top edge with a generous 1/4” seam. By using a seam allowance that’s slightly larger than 1/4”, you ensure that you won’t see any of the wonder tape in your finished project.

Be sure to backstitch at the beginning and end of every seam in this project.

Once the three pieces are sewn together, flip them so the In-R-Form is facing up. Pull the lining to one side (no need to press just yet).

While gently holding the lining to one side, secure the seam by sewing very close to the outer edge. I was about 1/16” from the edge of the In-R-Form.

Press the lining away from the zipper. It takes a bit of force to get it started since the In-R-Form is thick. Once I had the lining in place, I used steam to make it stay. Just be careful not to distort the zipper tape. We need it to be straight in order to sew the other side.

Once the lining is looking good, give a quick press from the top, as well.

Repeat the exact same process to sew the remaining fabric to the other side of the zipper. Layer the pieces in this order:

  1. Start with the remaining outside panel right side up.

  2. Place the sewn section on top. The outside panels should be touching, and the zipper teeth should be face down.

  3. Place the remaining lining fabric right sides down.

Make sure all of the fabric pieces (outside panels and lining) are aligned before fusing them with the wonder tape.

Once you have sewn and pressed both sides, your book sleeve will look like this. Now it’s time to turn it into a pouch.

Preparing to Sew

Important - Open the zipper most of the way. Slide the zipper head so there is only 2-3” of closed zipper between the panels. This is essential in allowing you to turn the bag right side out after you sew. There won’t be another chance to open the zipper, so make sure you do it now.

Flip the fabric so the outside panels are right sides together with each other. Do the same with the lining fabric. Be careful to line everything up, and use sewing clips to hold it all in place.

Make sure the zipper teeth are going towards the outside panels (close-ups to follow).

Also notice that I left a bigger gap between the clips at the bottom of the lining. That’s to remind me to leave an opening to turn the book sleeve right side out.

Important - Push the zipper teeth towards the outside panels. You can see here that the teeth are going to the outside, and the fabric tape is going towards the lining. You also want the closed teeth to be perfectly upright rather than twisted more towards one panel than the other.

On the open side of the zipper, be careful to line up the teeth as perfectly as possible. Once again, the teeth should go towards the outside panels and the fabric tape should go towards the lining.

This picture illustrates the difference between a sleeve that was sewn correctly and one that wasn’t. The sleeve in front was wrongly sewn with the zipper teeth towards the lining fabric. As a result, a significant amount of the corner was lost in the seam. Compare this to the correctly sewn sleeve in back, where the zipper goes all the way to the edge.

This makes a huge difference in the size of the opening. Between the two sides, I lost over an inch of zipper space on the front pouch! That really restricts the size of book that will fit inside.

Sewing

When you’re sure that everything is lined up and your zipper teeth are pointed towards the outside panels, you’re ready to sew.

Start sewing at the bottom of the lining near one corner, making sure to backstitch. Use a 3/4” seam allowance until you’re about 1” away from the zipper. In this final inch, angle your stitching so that your seam allowance is at 1/4” when you get to the zipper. Proceed slowly, and you should be able to sew right over the zipper since you’re using a denim needle.

Backstitch over the zipper to reinforce it, then continue around the outside panels with 1/4” seam. When you get to the other end of the zipper, go slowly and backstitch again. Angle back out to the 3/4” lining seam and continue sewing just past the bottom corner of the lining. Backstitch at the end of your seam, leaving at least a 4” gap for turning.

sew around book sleeve

Here’s a closeup of the transition from the 3/4” lining seam to the 1/4” seam for the zipper and outside panels. By sewing this way, you end up with a lining that lies nice and flat inside the finished book sleeve.

Reinforce the corners and the zipper with a tight zigzag stitch. I set my width to 1.0 and my length to 0.5.

Trim away the excess seam allowance. Leave about 1/4” seam around the lining. Make sure to leave the seam allowance along the opening, as well.

Trim the excess fabric from all 4 corners. Cut close to the zigzag stitching, being careful not to cut through any of the stitches.

Cut the excess zipper even with the outside panels.

Finishing

Reach through the opening in the bottom of the lining and grab a corner of the outside panels. Pull the outside towards the opening. Work gently to avoid popping your stitches as you pull the entire book sleeve right side out.

Use a chopstick or similar tool to poke all of the corners into shape. Be fairly gentle with this step. We reinforced our corners, but it’s still possible to break through the stitching if you’re too aggressive.

Fold the open seam to the inside of the lining to hide the raw edges. Give this a good press so it stays in place.

Sew along the entire bottom of the lining, very close to the edge. I used between 1/16” and 1/8” seam. Be sure to backstitch at the beginning and end.

Push the lining inside the book sleeve. Look how nice and flat it is! Since we sewed the lining with a larger seam allowance than the outside, it fits perfectly when everything is flipped right side out.

Give the sleeve a final press, and you’re finished! Now you can curl up with a good book, secure in the knowledge that it will be protected the next time you head out.

I had so much fun making these! They’re a little bit addictive. Every time I made one, I found three more fabrics I wanted to use to make some more. I hope you’ll give it a shot!

More Projects to Come

There’s lots more stops on the Holiday Gifts to You blog hop! Come back each day for another small project.

If you make something from the hop, we would love to see it! If you’re on Instagram, please use the hashtag #HolidayGiftsToYou and tag the designer so we can find your post. You can also share your projects in the Partners in Design Facebook group.

Schedule

The Small Print - We guarantee that the patterns and tutorials from this blog hop will be complimentary through December 31, 2020. After that, each designer is free to do as they wish.

Question for You

What’s your favorite book that you’ve read this year? Or your top few if it’s too hard to narrow it down?

I’ve read so many wonderful books this year! I think my top two are The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson and The Ten Thousand Doors of January by Alix E. Harrow.

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Tutorials, Sewing, Blog HopsBobbi Bridgemanbook sleeves, Partners in Design23 Comments