Refill Your Old Moleskine

Moleskines brand notebooks are awesome, but they are expensive. Let me show you how you can take your old Moleskine notebook and refill it with the slightly cheaper Moleskine Cahiers and still retain that classic Moleskine look and feel. If you want to save a little green, and maybe are slightly obsessed with Moleskine notebooks like myself, then this is for you.

Step 1 Gather The Materials

For this Moleskine Modification you will need the following Materials.

1. A Moleskine notebook. I have only done this particular hack using a ruled 3.5x5.5 notebook but I'm certain you could do this with the larger ones. Its your choice to use either a new one or one that you thought you might throw away because the first step will be removing the paper and some people just might not feel comfortable ripping a new one apart.

2. A pack of Moleskine Cahiers. (Two are only required so you will have one left over. If you buy two packs, you'll have refills for at least 3 uses. I thinks it a good deal)

3. Duct Tape. I prefer the black kind because it matches the outside of the moleskine, but there won't be any tape on the outside so its really just a continuity thing with me. Do as you please. My first time through I used electrical tape. It works fine but the duct tape works better and is easier to work with.

4. A thin but sturdy piece of cardboard or a strip of plastic about 5.5 inches in length and about .75 inches wide. (Optional, this isn't necessary but I think it helps the appearance, You will see.)

5. Two thin rubber bands or optionally two hair bands. (I went with the hair bands because I figured they wouldn't break as easy as the rubber bands.)

6. An exacto knife or any type of blade for precision cutting.

7. Two small binder clips. (optional)

8. 3x5 Index Cards. (Optional)

Comments

[linuxnewbie]

Great Idea! Look, you can go even cheaper and make your own notebooks from scratch- it's really easy! I bind my own notebooks- we call them Hedgehogs. "Invented" (As though cute blank books haven't been around for years) by Lee Peterson, you can check her how to files at the hedgehogsforever Yahoo Group.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/hedgehogsforever/?yguid=76553995

An excellent replacement for the cashiers you're using as refills is the sketchbook
http://www.instructables.com/id/Sketchbook-and-Moleskine-Test-Notebook/ That should take your costs down even further!

[Ender2007]

Very nice!
Thank you for sharing.

[Skullgrl]

Your idea is awesome! Thanks so much for taking the time to put this on here. I would have never thought to use the soft covers to refill my hard cover (my hard cover ran out and my mom had some soft covers laying around so I tried one but it just isn't the same). I think what I'll do instead of having the rubber bands (because I'm crazy about the way my notebooks look... Really, really crazy.) is remove the (soft)covers, add something to keep the signatures together (a piece of paper to attach it to the hard cover) or just re-sew them, then glue them in.

[biblicalgeek]

Glad you liked the idea. Keep us updated on how yours turns out. I'm intrigued by your gluing or sewing idea that eliminates the need for the bands.

[Skullgrl]

I may have to redo it but I have the concept down. I used about 2 and a bit of the softcover notebooks. I cut the pages out of them so they were still all held together in their signatures. I then stacked the 3 sets of signatures and glued (ok, mod pogded.) a strip of thin, fabric, (I think it was muslin) on the back of them (not the side you open to write). Then after re-inforcing the hardcover with some cardboard, I glued in the signatures. I found a tutorial for binding helps make I just said make some sense. Heh. http://tobycraig.livejournal.com/29223.html Scroll down to the part where he is gluing on the covers.

[biblicalgeek]

It would be great to see a picture of the finished project.

[beauwalker23]

brillant. i had actually bought the small 'mini' moleskin jornals and hated them becasue they were not hard back. Now i refilled my old one! thanks mate cheers.

[biblicalgeek]

Thanks for the comment. I'm glad you like the idea :-)

[biblicalgeek]

Thanks. I was inspired by Patrick Ng and his mind.Depositor.

You can check out the original here ...
http://moleskine.vox.com/library/post/minddepositor-by-scription.html

And not too long ago he built on the idea and came up with a new one here ...
http://moleskine.vox.com/library/post/minddepositor-2---leather-only.html

[Roman-ua]

Hil!!!
I live in Ukraine and Patrick's Mind.Depositor is sold in Ukraine :) But they are calling how Mind.Depositor 3
it's link

[biblicalgeek]

Patrick discovered this Mind.Depositor 3 and wasn't really pleased with it.
http://moleskine.vox.com/library/post/so-called-minddepositor-3-from-ukraine.html?_c=feed-rss-full

IMHO I think they look really bulky. I prefer something a little more streamlined and thin which is why I enjoy the moleskine so much.

[joejoerowley]

Nifty!