Caterpillar Stitch

According to Keith Smith's book, Non-Adhesive Binding, Vol. 3, Exposed Spine Sewings, the caterpillar stitch was learned from Betsy Palmer Eldridge. It is a lovely, strong and versatile stitch. You can use one or two colors of thread and you can curve the caterpillar or sew it straight. One thing I love about it is that from the "wrong side" all you see are short, straight stitches and in contrast, the stitches on the "right side" are fancy, indeed. The stitch is very strong because it sews each signature separately. And it is so pretty!



In my opinion, this stitch is difficult to decifer from Keith Smith's diagrams. With the help of a book arts buddy, we figured it out one evening. My first book sewn this way was typical of all my firsts-wonky and not-so-hot. I ended up sewing five books with the caterpillar stitch before I was satisfied with how it closed. The first few books were too tight (sprang open) or too loose (sloppy). Once I had a feel for how tight or loose to sew the signatures, I broke out my best painted papers and my favorite blue linen thread and sewed a 3" x 3" book I could be proud of. Yay!