Dennis Yuen
C’ai Lun
Bookbinder (Queens, NY)

Shop for journals by Dennis Yuen

Dennis Yuen makes handsome and thoughtful blank books that plead to be written in. They are colorful, superbly well-crafted tomes of various shapes and sizes bound between hard or soft covers. The books open flat and are filled with supple paper that warmly invites pen or pencil, both vital details for people who want to actually use the books.

The exposed bindings are perhaps the most unique and fascinating element of Dennis’ books, with their tight multi-colored stitching or simply tied ribbons. He practices Coptic, long stitch, stab, pamphlet, and flat-back binding to name a few, often applying variations on these traditional techniques to fascinating effect. These are books to be enjoyed as objects as well as functioning journals—the perfect marriage of art and life.

Dennis writes, “When people encounter a book of mine, I’d like them to hold it, touch it and interact with it. Only when a book is being held, opened and interacted with, it becomes alive and wholesome as an object. The next step is to hope that people will actually use it. A book can manifest its potential when it helps its owner to think and to write, it should be able to augment the thought process when used.”

Dennis is a self-taught bookmaker who has honed his craft by studying books and experimenting over many years. He has been making books since he was a kid, and made multi-media book projects as a teenager as a way to express the longings and intense emotions of those years. In 2003 he started making books professionally and, to record his projects and offer instruction, he began the weblog Cai Lun (