Wasted $60 on a cheap bone folder that left rust marks on my paper

I figured a bone folder is just a bone folder, right? Picked up a no-name plastic one from a craft store for $60 and within 2 weeks it had this weird rough edge that scratched my endpapers. Worse part was the metal core inside started rusting through the plastic somehow and left orange stains on a whole stack of handmade paper I was using for a project. Anyone else had luck with a specific brand of bone folder that actually holds up?

3 comments

3 Comments

jackson.jenny10d ago

Heard from a bookbinder friend that actual bone folders never rust.

wood.john10d ago

Funny you mention rust. I once left a cheap metal ruler near a damp book and it looked like a crime scene from a 90s cop show a week later. Guess a plastic folder is better than explaining rusty stains on someone's heirloom pages.

the_jason10d ago

Actual bone folders never rust" - that's what I thought too, but then I bought one from a seller on Etsy that claimed it was "genuine bone" and it turned out to be some kind of bovine knuckle with a metal pin hammered through the middle. That pin rusted out within a month and stained a whole stack of letterhead I was using for a wedding invitation set. How do you even tell if what you're buying is solid bone versus some composite with metal guts before you waste money on it?