Making a Zine or PhotoBook
Class - Photography | Available
Photos are meant to be displayed and printed, and in this class, touched and arranged. In this hands on, AI-free workshop. Learn to make your own, one-of-a-kind Zine or Photo Book. Grow to understand the importance of sequencing and arrangement to tell your story visually. Students will work with printed material, scissors, and glue before ever touching a computer, because pacing and story come from the physical act of
laying pages next to each other. Everyone leaves with a finished, bound zine or photobook to call their own.
- Though this class is primarily for photographers feel free to bring wide range of imagery from the phone, or drawings, physical prints, and/or found materials if it aligns with your theme.
Week 1 — Gathering & Editing
Hands-on: students bring 30–50 images/pieces of source material and do a physical edit
print or use existing prints, spread them on a table, and cut the set down to 15–20
In-class exercise: “the edit is the essay” - talk through why certain images got cut
Week 2 — Sequencing
Hands-on: working in spreads (2-page units), students physically arrange their edited images on
the floor or table
Exercise: pacing (where to place a quiet image next to a loud one, where to give a full spread to
one photo vs. a grid of four) Try 2–3 different sequences before committing
Week 3 — Structure & Binding
Demo and Hands-on: 2–3 binding methods (saddle-stitch (stapled), pamphlet stitch
(hand-sewn), and single-sheet folded zine)
Students choose a binding method suited to their page count and start assembling a mock
dummy. Discussion of paper stock, cover material, size/format decisions.
Week 4 — Final Assembly & Share
Students finalize layout, print final pages (in-house printer or students bring pages printed at
home). Full assembly and binding of the final piece. Closing share-around: everyone presents
their finished zine/book.
Alexandra Robinson
Alexandra Robinson is an independent creative working across photography, curation, art direction, and publications. Her work is grounded in fine art installations and storytelling from a feminist lens, exploring what it means to belong to a place, a home, a lineage, shaped by a life lived across the United States, France, and Costa Rica. She holds a MFA in photography from Savannah College of Art and Design and a BFA in photography from Paris College of Art.