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I found a great deal of pleasure hand-making my own books back in the 90s, when print-on-demand meant a rubber stamp and the internet was powered by rubbing two sticks together. It’s a labor of love, so I get where you’re coming from. When done right, the end result is often a far more sensual object (did I just say that?) than a book from Createspace or Lulu [Note: I’m not knocking either service, I’ve used them both quite happily].
Book-making is a craft in and of itself, but it can be done. Here are some things to at least get you started.
(By the way, out of respect to people who make handmade books for a living, I should point out that this is not comprehensive, but should get you well on your way to your goal. Also, I've tried to define technical terms below in brackets.).
Think about Double-sided vs Single-sided printing
Double-sided. If you’re printing at home on a laser printer (good choice), you’ll make more work for yourself if you print double-sided. Because typically four pages will fit on a single sheet of paper, your layout software will need to have imposition [page re-arrangement] capabilities. A professional printer imposes pages themselves, taking it out of the designer’s hands, but as a home-based bookmaker, you’ll need to carefully figure out what pages go where. Your safest bet is to create a dummy of the book: count how many pages are in your book, divide by four, then fold that many sheets of paper in half, stuff them into signatures [collections of sheets to be bound together], and then hand number each one; disassemble your dummy and you’ll see what pages go where. In your software, rearrange the pages (for example, pages 1 and 8 will be across from each other, and on the reverse side, pages 2 and 7 will be across from each other). Print accordingly. Note: work on a copy of your final layout file in case things get messed up and you have to start over.
Single-sided. If you print singled-sided, print two-up spreads (with even inside/outside margins, and the page numbers all in the same position on each page) and then cut down the middle. I used to carefully hand tear five sheets at a time. It gave the right edge a nice deckle that was aesthetically pleasing and people who received the book noticed that before they noticed that pages weren’t printed on both sides.
Once you’ve committed to the above, work on your page layout and binding
Margins, measures and leading. I touched on this briefly above, but your decision to print double-sided vs single-sided will affect your page layout. A book that is bound into signatures will likely have uneven margins. This is a design decision and has a large effect on the pleasure people will take in the book. Some books benefit from wide-open outside and bottom margins, others beg for thin outside margins. Ultimately, your margins control the measure [length] of your line and the measure of your line will affect the depth of your leading [line-spacing] and all of these factors will affect how many pages you will be printing.
It will almost certainly cost more to print a beautifully designed book, even from home. Then again, this is where a lot the pleasure comes in. Have fun.
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