Assembly;
As can be seen below, I have been preparing and piecing together all the relevant parts in the production of my packaging. It needed a little fine tuning along the way to try and make sure it was sturdy enough for its' purpose, but the shell came together relatively painlessly, albeit the process was time consuming.



I suitably gridded-up the wallpaper so that it was ready to attach. Pasting the wallpaper to the shell itself was also laborious as I am intent to keep it free from knocks and blemishes where possible. I'm glad to say that by the time I'd finished putting it together it was relatively pristine and the colour was looking beautifully seductive.

The foam tray in the base was a bit trickier than I had imagined as the concrete sample did not really fit as I had first anticipated, so I needed to make some minor adjustments to the routed tray so that it slotted in without any trouble. The lid that houses the look book was a little easier to fit, but does not grip the object sufficiently to have it suspended within the box whilst it is flush to the foam, so it has had to be recessed a fair bit. This is a great shame, but without purpose built high-density foam it just simply cannot hold properly when flush.

Ultimately, the inner workings of the packaging has had to be compromised somewhat to allow for these factors (sample size, grip, access, etc). To be held tight and flush to the foam it would have meant really squeezing in both the sample and book, but this would render access to them really frustrating. A compromise had to be made, but it still keeps the overall aesthetic and concept of the product. It could have been far worse.

Book Binding;
Went to the binders I sourced in St. Pauls today to have the book bound. I had a couple of copies made, so I have spare if for any reason there should be problems. Each copy had to be bound twice because of the fabric. Once with buckrum and then once again with the fabric. The books were velo bound so that the spreads would sit correctly in the page without any white creeping in the centre, in between the pages.

On the whole, I am pleased with the result of the binding. I think the book looks really great and fulfils the purpose that it was required to do perfectly. The cover, I feel, is a strong aspect and has come out beautifully. If I was being particularly picky, I would have liked a better quality of print as I feel some of the quality and colours of the imagery have not come out as I would have expected. However, as I said previously, on the whole, a very pleasing result indeed.