How to Make a Collapsible Punching Cradle: New Video on Our YouTube Channel |

We’ve reached the end of Preservation Week and what better way to celebrate than with a fun how-to video on our Lab’s YouTube channel?!

This video goes over how to make a collapsible punching cradle, step-by-step. Punching cradles are a useful bookbinding tool to have on hand in your toolbox. They allow you to create uniform sewing stations in your signatures or gatherings when you are preparing to sew a textblock. Best of all, this type of punching cradle is fully collapsible and easy to store while not in use; especially when you make one of these simple slipcases to hold all the pieces.

Here you can see a collapsed punching cradle stored in a paper slipcase made with marbled paper (left) and a punching cradle assembled and ready for use (right).

Don’t forget to “like” our video and subscribe to our YouTube channel to stay in the loop when we post new videos to the channel. If you decide to make your own punching cradle, we’d love to know what you thought of the video or, even better, tag us in a photo of it on Instagram (@thepreservationlab).

We hope you’ve enjoyed celebrating Preservation Week 2021 with us! We look forward to celebrating our 11th annual Preservation Week next year…maybe even in person this time?!

Jessica Ebert (UCL) – Conservation Tech & Photographic Documentation Specialist