An awl is essential for making most non-adhesive styles of book. We offer three different awls, all of which we use almost every day. Shown here, left to right:

Light-weight awl, for piercing holes in your signatures to prepare for sewing

Medium-weight awl with replaceable needle, for piercing thicker pieces of paper as well as binder’s board. (This awl —imported from Germany exclusively by Bari Zaki Studio— comes with an extra needle.)

Medium-weight awl (whose needle is not replaceable). We personally like to start with this awl, to create “dimples” in the board, and then switch to our other medium-weight awl to actually pierce.

Wrapped in our complimentary signature style: white tissue, French embroidery thre& our favourite washi tape of the day.