Hardback books – the hero you’ve always needed!

If you’re looking to go that extra mile to showcase your work, project or memories, hardback books are the high impact, prestigious print option. Built to stand the test of time, discover our new range hardback book options here, complete with all the info you need on sizes, paper stocks, binding and artwork requirements.

Sleek hardback books to show off

These robust, professional casebound books offer an upgrade from the traditional perfect bound brochures, making them ideal for when you need something extra special. They’re the perfect choice for cherished memories, and as wedding photobooks, professional or creative portfolios, yearbook printing, prospectuses and more. Featuring a hard front and back cover with 32-400 pages inside, you can really bring your work to life.

5 size options

We offer our hardback books in five size formats to compliment your work:

A5 landscape

A5 portrait

A4 landscape

A4 portrait

210mm x 210mm

Landscape orientation is great for visual, image heavy books, while portrait is sometimes preferred for copy heavy collateral, but it’s all about you and how you want to express your design after all!

Paper stock perfection

Choosing the right paper stock will give your hardback book printing the professionalism it deserves. With thickness available in 100gsm to 170gsm, here’s a quick rundown of all the paper stocks we currently offer hardback book printing on:

Silk

Silk paper is super smooth, with a slight matt surface sheen.

Uncoated

Uncoated card is a thicker version of everyday paper, without any treatments or coatings.

Gloss

Gloss has a high surface shine and a smooth finish. Ink dries well on gloss, so you’re unlikely to need lamination.

Finishing touches 

For extra protection, we laminate the covers of all of our hard back books as standard.

Choose from matt, velvet or gloss lamination to create your print, your way. Our lamination is applied edge to edge, for a neat, protected finish.

Binding a book

Hardback books are an extra special product so the way they are created is through a specialised case binding method. The front and back cover of your hardback book is printed on your choice of paper, which is then wrapped around thick card to create the ‘case’ for your inner pages.

Hardback books are printed in stages as they comprise of different elements. The case is made up of the front and back cover, plus the spine, which is printed as one piece and wrapped around three pieces of sturdy grey board.

The first and last page of your book are glued against the inside cover, creating a neat finish that ensures the inside of your book stays exactly where it’s supposed to be. These pages are printed on uncoated paper and they’ll be unprinted, so you don’t need to include these pages in your artwork document as we’ll do this for you.

Inner pages are glued separately to the case to create a strong, long-lasting durable product. The glue we use is extra strong and can withstand high and low temperatures. It’s also super flexible, allowing your book to lie flat without cracking the spine.

The final step is assembling your book, which is done by bonding the front and back pages of the end papers to the inside of the cased cover. This creates a sturdy, professional finish, and because the book block floats free from the spine, it will lay flat when opened.

Artwork requirements and top tips

To make sure that your hardback book is printed perfectly, we need to make sure that your artwork fits precise measurements. This means that we sometimes might need to make minor adjustments. For this reason, we can only accept vector-based PDFs for hardback book printing. The easiest way to do this is by using one of our templates and spine calculator when preparing your artwork.

To get the very best results for your print, we also recommend supplying your file as a PDF in a CMYK colour space.

Downloadable templates

For quick, easy print that’s perfect every time, download one of our free artwork templates. Each one comes supplied with borders, bleed lines and helpful tips. Top tip: Although you can create your artwork with the usual software packages like Adobe InDesign or Quark Express, don’t forget to export your designs to PDF format before supplying them to us. And, remember to supply the cover spread separately to the main pages of the book too.

So, what are you waiting for?! Shop hardback books here!