If you've ever found yourself with a growing pile of envelopes, tags, booklets, and loose ephemera with nowhere to put it all, this flip-through is for you. I'm sharing three envelope journals — or ephemera storage books, as I think of them — that I made for my Etsy shop. Each one is a collection of bound envelopes and handmade pockets, all filled with materials you can pull straight into your journal-making projects.
What we cover
This is a flip-through of one complete ephemera storage book, with a look at all twelve bound envelopes and pockets inside — what's in them, how they're made, and the different ways you might use them. I also touch on how the books are constructed, including a note about tea dyeing and what happens to the envelopes when you do it.
What you'll learn
How bound envelopes work as journal pockets — each of the twelve sections in this book is either a full envelope or an open pocket. Some close, some are two-sided open pockets, and some are origami-style. The variety gives you flexibility for storing flat items, folded pieces, or bulkier scraps.
What to fill an ephemera storage book with, including:
- Doilies, lace, and decorative paper pieces
- Scrappy staggered booklets (I have a tutorial linked for those)
- Wraparound envelopes made from book pages
- Wallpaper samples — great for making small journals
- Cereal bag pockets and book page pouches
- Leather scraps, embossed papers, and paper bags
- Tags, postcards, stickers, altered playing cards, and butterfly embellishments
Using a twelve-section structure as an organiser — one envelope per month is an idea I love. You can tuck a small handmade mini book inside each one — a January book, a February book — and build out a whole year's worth of journaling in a single bound volume.
How to make the book itself — I made all the envelopes individually, then bound them into the book. The construction is straightforward bookbinding, and if you're comfortable adding signatures, you can stitch extra ones into the spine to give yourself writing space between the envelope sections.
Why tea dyeing envelopes needs one extra step — when I tea dyed some of the envelopes for this book, the glue let go and they opened up. The fix is simple: seal them shut after binding. It's easy to miss if you're not expecting it.
How the covers will vary — because I'm cutting from sections of a larger piece of material, the front of each book looks a little different. If you're purchasing one, you'll get one of the three — which is also just something to keep in mind if you're making your own version from a patterned or printed material.
Tips & gotchas
Tea dyeing is beautiful on envelopes, but the moisture does loosen the glue seam. After you've bound everything in, go back and seal any envelopes that have come open — a little PVA or a glue stick along the flap is enough. Don't skip this step or you'll lose the pocket function entirely.
If you're making one of these yourself and want more than just ephemera storage, add a signature or two into the spine binding. It doesn't complicate the structure much, and it gives you actual writing pages sitting between the envelope sections. I find the books feel more complete that way.
When working with a decorative cover material — especially wallpaper or anything with a bold print — cut placement will change how the front looks from book to book. If you're making multiples to sell or give as gifts, it's worth planning your cuts or being upfront that each one will be its own version of the same material.
For the envelopes that have text or writing visible on the inside, covering that with a strip of coordinating paper before filling keeps the inside looking intentional rather than accidental. I have a walkthrough of this in my wallpaper journal tutorial if you want to see exactly how I do it.
These books are surprisingly time-consuming to put together — filling twelve pockets with curated pieces takes longer than it looks. But that's also part of what makes them satisfying to use. Everything inside has been chosen, which means whoever opens it has a ready-made kit of materials to work with.
The tutorials for the wraparound envelope, the scrappy booklets, the cereal bag pockets, and the altered playing cards are all linked below if you want to make any of the elements you see here from scratch.
