Sketchbooks, make them yourself!

July 4, 2021 / Diann Zimmerman

Save money! Make your own watercolor sketchbooks!

I took four 10 inch x 14 inch Arches pads to my local FedEx Office store. Within an hour, they turned those 4 pads into watercolor sketchbooks: four 7 x 10 inch and eight 4-1/2 x 6 inch! They turned out great, and so much cheaper than buying a watercolor sketchbook. And the paper is ARCHES!

I bought the pads on sale for $12 each (it was an amazing sale a few months ago from Michaels) and paid $40 to have the books bound. I ended up with 12 sketchbooks.

$48 Cost of paper

$40 Binding cost

$88 total for 12 sketchbooks = $7.33 per sketchbook (and 4 of them are 7 x 10 inch!)

They also cut a huge stack of 11 x 15 inch Fabriano 25% cotton paper that I bought from Jackson’s when it was on sale. My stack of 100 large sheets is now 400 5 x 7 inch sheets! This is such a convenient size to paint.

Approved by Cucumber!

Most office supply stores have binding services. Check it out to see if you can save some money making your own sketchbooks!

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