Perfectbound Books - our most popular
Most of the colorful covers you see throughout our website were designed for "perfectbound" books. Perfect binding is the printer's term for the glued binding you see in quality paperback books. This kind of binding is great for thicker books, and can include text on the spine.
The covers of perfectbound books are generally laminated for a glossy finish and they are printed in full color, all the way to the edges. This is a beautiful way to display a stunning photograph or artwork.
Most book printers use standard papers for the interior and cover. The inside of the cover is left white and cannot be printed.
Saddle-Stitched Books
You are probably familiar with "saddle stitching" in booklets. The printer takes a small stack of paper, folds it down the middle, and staples the pages through the fold. Yes, the staples are the "stitching". This kind of binding works best for 40 pages (10 sheets of paper, including the cover) or less. If there are too many sheets of paper, the books get "springy" and they don't stay closed.
Color covers are usually made by choosing cover stock with a rich color and texture, rather than by printing the color onto the paper. These books can have all kinds of special options: embossing or foil stamping (see examples below), beautiful papers, raised print, colored inks, and holes for ribbons. Depending on the color and embossing, we can generally print on the inside covers of saddle-stitched books.
Special cover features
Since the covers for saddle-stitched books can be any color or textured paper, these covers can also have special options:
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blind embossing (upper right) creates a raised design by pressing the paper into a die.
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foil stamping (lower right) applies a metallic design to the
paper.
Book Sizes
When you walk into a synagogue, chances are the siddur you will use is about 6"x9" (a reduced version is upper right). That's a really good size for holding, and for fitting enough readable words on a page. Most of our perfectbound books are within 1/2" of that size in each dimension.
Our saddle-stitched books are generally printed on 8.5"x11" paper and folded in half, for a 5.5"x8.5" finished size.
Some people prefer a larger book. Our printers will make both styles
of book in finished sizes as large as 8.5"x11" (proportionally reduced version is lower right). We find that making larger books does not generally reduce the number of pages very much, because the margins are wider and the fonts tend to be larger.
We can also make 5"x8" books. Special orders can go down to 4.25"x7" for small benchers, or we can have them cut down to even smaller sizes. Small-format books tend to require very small font sizes.
Book Opening
Most families expect their siddur to open in the Hebrew direction (spine on the right, as in the pictures of the saddle-stitched and perfectbound books), so that's our standard. But we also happily make them to open the English way.
Fonts
Choosing the fonts for your siddur is all about your taste.
CustomSiddur has a wide selection of English and Hebrew fonts. The most popular and readable are Times Roman (Eng) and David (Heb) but there are lots of options. We can use different fonts or sizes for headings, prayers, letters, and Torah/Haftarah portions.
Click here for the font sample page as PDF
