Renegade Bookbinding Guild

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Community
Name: Renegade Publishing, Renegade Bindery
Date(s): August 17th 2020 - ongoing
Moderator: Kameron, Aliya, ArmoredSuperHeavy, Desmothene, Wolffe
Founder: ArmoredSuperHeavy
Type: Community for fanbinders
Fandom: Various
URL: The group's tumblr Renegade Guild website
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Renegade Publishing, (renamed in 2024 to the Renegade Bookbinding Guild[1]) is a guild of artists engaged in fanbinding - publishing in extremely limited edition fannish works, including fanfiction, meta, original fic, zines and other works. Most works are made in handmade editions of one or two copies.[2] The group grew out of a popular tumblr text post and associated resource document by ArmoredSuperHeavy explaining their motivations for binding longfic as high quality, formal-looking books. They explicitly mentioned gift economics as part of their philosophy.[3] Other artists and publishers in the guild have their own philosophies and preferred binding styles.

Renegade Bookbinding Guild has a website, a tumblr, a Twitter, an instagram, and a Dreamwidth. The Renegade Bookbinding Guild Discord server is called the Renegade Bindery available to anyone who asks off anon. The Bindery hosts resource lists for multiple continents, thanks to industrious members located around the globe. The Discord server was created in June 2020. As of March 2023, it reached two thousand members.

Past and Present Events

In April 2022, Renegade Publishing was a sponsor of HavenCon, a "small, community based, LGBTQIA+ multigenre fandom convention that takes place in Austin, Tx."[4][5] Several members of Renegade Publishing, including founder ArmoredSuperHeavy attended the convention, which became Renegade's first in-person meet-up. Members of Renegade hosted a community panel called "Why Fanbinding?"[6] that discussed the group's motivations for fanbinding, their support of the fandom gift economy, the founding of Renegade Publishing, and how to become a fanbinder. The group also hosted a more informal meetup to provide an opportunity to answer and discuss questions about fanbinding as a craft and to display books and some on-the-spot fanbinding.

The Renegade Bindery (the discord) hosts several fanbinding-related events throughout the year[7]:

  • Binderary is a month-long event in February, modeled off of NaNoWriMo or Inktober. Fanbinders set goals for how many books they want to complete within a month, selecting from varying levels of difficulty. Members host classes and talks about subjects related to fanbinding and bookbinding throughout the month.
  • Renegade Exchange is a gift exchange between members of typeset or bound fanfiction (members may choose to participate in either the digital-only or the digital-and-hardcopy exchanges. Author permission is required for a work to be gifted as a typeset or in hard copy.
  • FFWAD, or FanFiction Writer's Appreciation Day, is celebrated by gifting an author a copy of their fanfiction work.

Renegade also participates in several non-Renegade originating events, such as:

  • Edible Book Day (1 April), "an international event where edible books are created, presented, photographed, and consumed."[8] Renegade first participated in 2023 and hosted two baking classes.[9] Pictures of edible book entries from Renegade can be found here.

Collaborative Projects

My Immortal

Shortly after the formation of the Bindery in 2020, a handful of members decided to embark on a momentous undertaking: turning the infamous badfic My Immortal into the hard copy monstrosity it deserved. The project started in September 2020 and was completed in June 2022. Each chapter of the story was given to a different member, who then designed the chapter while ignoring "good design and good taste"[10] and also whatever anyone else was doing. Renegade member runawaymarbles was the first to finish this Handbinding Project: My Immortal, Archived version from the completed document. Additional Bindery members who created at least one unique chapter design, are: sapphyblue, omgreylo, Aliyaregatti, mirilya, queenofzan, ve, marvinhere, LeonardDaQuirm, SherezadeS, and parsley.

Free Imposition Software

Bookbinders often use software called an imposer to place pages of a book from a PDF in the correct order for printing. Bookbinder 3.0 was a common free program used for this process, but around 2021 some Renegade members experienced consistent errors in trying to use it. Renegade Bindery member momijizukamori started and completed work on project to update and recreate Bookbinder (now called Bookbinder JS), but allowed for using it online without installing locally. [11] They were later joined by fellow Renegade Bindery members sithel and Lottie, who worked to assist in expanding the capabilities of Bookbinder to allow for multiple sizes for imposition, including for tiny books. Another Renegade Bindery member, katethereader, created a guide to using the new Bookbinder JS for imposition.

Articles and Mentions

ArmoredSuperHeavy was featured in an Organization for Transformative Works guest post in October 2020, covering their history of fanbinding and the creation of the Renegade discord server. [12] The discord server has also hosted several fan studies academics as part of their research into fanbinding practices and is mentioned in two of these studies.[13]

Robin's Egg Bindery and Fanbound Books, both members of Renegade, were featured in an OTW Guest Post on 15 July, 2023. They spoke about the continued growth of Renegade, the future of Renegade as an organization, and their personal sources of inspiration.[14]

Example Works

Star Wars Sequel Trilogy:

Over the Garden Wall:

The Eagle of the Ninth:

IT:

The Old Guard:

Our Flag Means Death:

Non-Fanfiction:

References

  1. ^ The Renegade tumblr has been renamed to "Renegade Bookbinding Guild." https://renegadeguild.tumblr.com/. Accessed 19 April 2024.
  2. ^ From the group's about page, archived here on August 18, 2020.
  3. ^ ArmoredSuperHeavy, I bind fanfic and other underground writing into real books. I am a Guerrilla publisher. May 22, 2020. Archived from the original on Jan 10, 2021.
  4. ^ [1], HavenCon FAQ page
  5. ^ [2], HavenCon 2022 Sponsor List
  6. ^ [3], HavenCon 2022 Events and Panels Schedule
  7. ^ [4], Renegade Events
  8. ^ https://nationaltoday.com/edible-book-day/
  9. ^ https://renegadepublishing.dreamwidth.org/tag/events:+edible+book+day
  10. ^ [https://iwilltrytobereasonable.tumblr.com/post/689410637801095168/runawaymarbles-handbinding-project-my-immortal}
  11. ^ https://github.com/momijizukamori/bookbinder-js#readme
  12. ^ https://www.transformativeworks.org/otw-guest-post-armoredsuperheavy/
  13. ^ https://journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/twc/article/view/2107/2937 https://journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/twc/article/view/2129/2947
  14. ^ OTW Guest Post: Fanboundbooks and robins-egg-bindery. 15 July, 2023. Access 29 December, 2023.
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