The Gilded Leaf: Fine Bookbinding & Restoration

iPads Finely Bound

2011-12-20T19:17:00.006-06:00

We've been working on several designs for iPad cases: a "Full" and a "Slim". They are made to look and feel like a fine antique book with raised bands, gold tooling and sumptuous materials. The Full features a hardwood frame slotted for access to ports and switches, with a slideout tray underneath for storing earphones, cords, stylus, etc. It's the size of a large book and (compared to the iPad) fairly bulky.

The Slim is no larger than many iPad cases on the market but beautifully made of fine leathers and handmarbled papers.

At present (meaning until we get a large order from StuffMart and farm it all out to China), every case is built to order, with a variety of woods, leathers, and decorative papers available. The two pictured feature deep brown morocco leather spines and corners, the Slim's leather tray fashioned from olive-colored kangaroo. They can be titled however desired, personalized with name, company, or ostensibly clever phrases like "Luddite's Revenge" pictured above. Inquire for prices.

Literary Reconstruction

2011-05-31T17:16:00.013-05:00

I've begun working on an important collection of several 17th and 18th century poets, or at least their literary remains. Currently on the bench are two 1674 editions of George Herbert's "The Temple" and a 1720 2-volume quarto edition of the poetical works of John Milton. A partially disbound copy of "The Temple" was pulled, mended, resewn, bound, and tooled in the photos above. A second copy needing no text repair was rebound in dark calf, the last picture above. (Pictured lying on "Walton's Lives", in for a reattachment of its boards. The Milton volumes below need new spines, having been rebacked in weak sheepskin sometime last century, those weak joints finally splitting apart. The original headbands were gone, having been replaced with a thick cord tucked into the headcap, so they're being resewn in the photos posted here. The new headbands will be age-toned to match their respective edges (top edges are usually dirtier than bottom) and will go unnoticed (as they should) when the new leather has been worked on. A cloth inner joint was visible and machine-made pastedowns had just been applied over the originals, so those layers were removed all the way back to the original leather turnins. The original leather has been treated with a consolidant, all later materials eliminated, and labels saved in case they're worth reusing. (That'll be decided when new leather is in place and the final results can better be anticipated.) More pics as we progress!

Speaking of bookbinding....

2011-05-31T07:59:00.003-05:00

I enjoyed a visit to Nashville last weekend, giving a lecture on bookbinding at their public library's Special Collections Center. With 3 librarians and a number of book artists in attendance, it was a lively crowd, and the hour-and-a-half went by quickly. We talked about a variety of techniques, the future of the book, the demise of trade binderies and apprenticeships and the sad effect on quality, and even covered (briefly) the advertised topics!

An Unusual Ledger Construction

2011-05-18T10:31:00.007-05:00

Some years ago I happened on several rolls of a canvas-backed slitted paper in a bankrupt bindery in North Dakota. They had at one time made large ledgers for county records, and while hauling away a treasure trove of tools, I saved a few of their ledgers and the rolls of material.

This past month, a ledger arrived for repair that used this now unusual method; the cloth being folded into a continuous Z and each section being sewn to the peaks. It's an interesting way to solve a real problem: how to make a strong flexible binding that will open ALL the way to the fold. I have "Portland Guard" stuck in my head as the name of the hinge material, but would love to hear from anyone that can tell me more! The pictures show a view from the spine, an intact ledger opened, the "Portland Guard" unrolled, and a view of what remains of the spine after the sections have been removed for mending.

Cook's Voyages

2011-01-20T19:07:00.003-06:00

Half the fun in the restoration business is working on great books few of us ever get to see. These photos are of a 1779 2-volume edition of Captain James Cook's "Voyage toward the South Pole, and around the World. Performed in His Majesty's Ships The Resolution and Adventure." The textblocks were fairly tight, though some fold-out maps needed mending. New headbands were sewn over round cores and the whole rebound in sprinkled calf. I'm trying out new calf, still searching for a replacement of Pearce's inimitable (and no longer available) vegetable-tanned calf. This is from Franz Hoffman in Germany and tooled very nicely, though it wasn't fun at all to pare. (The animal is a little older and the hide much tougher.)

Flowers Personified: A Leather Rebacking

2011-01-05T08:21:00.009-06:00

The hand-colored title page and a closeup of new leather turn-ins.

Cloth joints oversewn and a picture of the detached spine The close-up shows new leather worked under old and new headcaps formed, prior to color touchup and blending..

Close-ups of the reattached spine, with new leather running from the reattached spine to the triple gold lines.

"Flowers Personified" is an unusually beautiful volume, handcolored throughout "with 52 female figures adorned with flower costumes." The textblock was in very good condition but, as is typical with books of this period (mid 19th century), there was virtually nothing holding the boards on beyond the thin covering leather and paper inner joints. As a result, both spine and boards were detached.

After cleaning the back of the textblock, linen joints were oversewn. This is a somewhat invasive procedure, but is at times invaluable for catching up loose sections front and back and for providing solid support across the joints. (The debate can rage on in the comments if you like.) To finish preparation of the textblock, the spine was relined with a new hollow.

The leather on the boards was lifted (you can see the cut right next to the three gold lines) and matching black morocco was worked around the spine and underneath the original sides. The original spine was cleaned from the backside (extra layers of lining material removed), headcap areas were thinned, and then it was laid back over the new spine. New leather was blended with the old and though the camera flash is merciless, the repairs are fairly invisible to the untrained eye. This type of rebacking is perhaps the most common "surgery" performed by book doctors, and similar techniques are used for clothbound books.

Gold Foil: Imitation or Genuine?

2010-12-27T08:53:00.005-06:00

If you've been at the craft for very long, chances are you've picked up a few unidentified rolls of gold foil. Cloth bindings aren't very particular; they like cheap foil as much as the real thing. If you use imitation gold on leather, however, it doesn't take very long before the fake gold loses its luster and turns a corroded green.

In February, I took a box of unidentified foil and stamped a sample card with each one. In just a few months, I had proof of which foils were imitation and, as an added bonus, had a sample card to help choose between different shades of the real stuff. In the picture, stamps 1 through A are from February, with 1, 6, 7 & 8 being fake. The photo doesn't really capture this well. The imitation foils are now black, which can be rubbed off with a thumbnail to reveal a dull metallic underneath. The genuine foil is bright and crisp and with a variety of shades from almost white through a reddish-orange tint.

I tested a second batch (B-H) on December 16th. C and H look dark in the photo, but that's just from the flash. Pretty slow and very low tech, but time reveals true character! (Insert wise proverb here...)

Wedding Guest Book for Korean Bride

2010-07-19T20:45:00.005-05:00

This wedding guest book for a Korean bride was sewn on double cords laced into boards, top edge gilt, and bound in alum-tawed goatskin with patterned silk sides, handsewn headbands of white and yellow over a round core. It stands upright in a fitted box with ribbon to lift it out and a large compartment for cards and other memorabilia. The box is covered in creme patterned silk with bone closures. Also pictured is the maid of honor (the binder's wife) and our daughter in traditional Korean hanboks

Hammond Glider Saw, Rouse Angle Cutting Saw

2010-04-11T17:38:00.012-05:00

Hammond Glider Saw ($500) and Rouse Angle Cutting saw ($120), both wired for 110. Inquire with bob@gildedleafbindery.com, (865) 621-7923. All offers (trades too) will be seriously considered.

Rebacking a Clothbound book with Leather

2010-03-12T21:06:00.005-06:00

Though our usual goal in restoration is to keep the book as original as possible, we'll occasionally take liberties when doing so will make for a better book. In this case, the original spine was missing, and any new cloth spine would, despite careful coloring and aging, have had a difficult time matching perfectly. So, we opted for a complete contrast, choosing a dark leather and tooling in a style reminiscent of the original covers. The boards were split and the leather was tucked between them without disturbing the inner paper joints.

Blue Morocco

2010-02-20T19:51:00.004-06:00

11" by 15" springback ledger. Guestbook with several pages of text and 500 blank pages. Bound in blue morocco and tooled in blind and gold.

ESV Study Bible in Dark Brown Morocco

2010-01-13T19:49:00.006-06:00

ESV Study Bible rebound in dark brown morocco, leather floral onlays (red and green) on front cover. Cloth inner joints, marbled endpapers, Scripture verse tooled around inner dentelles. "The Delight Of His Eyes" reference is from Ezekiel and is used in describing his wife.

Dragons and Black Leather

2009-12-01T10:46:00.005-06:00

Dragons and Black Leather
Here’s a “non-traditional” approach to leather that actually harkens back to the earliest book form. Featuring a wrap-around cover with a leather tie, this modern version in black leather was made for the local Harley Davidson motorcycle shop. Sewn on three linen tapes, it has hard covers, decorative endpapers, a matching top edge, and an inlaid leather dragon. A simpler version with a pre-sewn textblock and simple embossed dragon is also available.

Rebacking Audubon's Quadrupeds

2009-09-29T18:04:00.003-05:00

Here's a very nice example of a blind-tooled set from the late 1800's: minimal use of gold on the front cover, with a little more bling around the marbled pastedowns inside. Though we'd often reuse the original spines, this three volume set's were missing or in pieces and it was an easy decision to start fresh. Morocco sides were lifted along a tooled line and new spines were built of matching brown goatskin. The use of simple lines without gold is a great look and aesthetically places this rebound set right back where they started from.

Rebacking a 19th Century half-calf book

2009-09-07T10:05:00.006-05:00

Flora Rustica, from the library of Charles Haddon Spurgeon. This is a good example of the rebacking of a 19th century half-calf volume. The boards were detached and portions of the spine were missing. Sometimes (particularly with ornately tooled family Bibles or important publisher's cloth bindings) we'll insert new material under the original and put the old spine right back on. On other occasions, replacing the aged leather is more appropriate. This time, we built new boards with new leather corners and spine, used the original cloth sides and leather spine label, and then tooled the new leather to match the old. The result is a book that looks very much like an immaculately preserved original. Spurgeon's bookplate was, of course, carefully lifted from the original pastedown and reattached.

Of interest to some may be the scrap paper the last binder used to line his boards underneath the cloth. They are the paper covers (wraps) and ads from another natural history volume. I'll often use scrap paper from our printer tray. which I'm sure will make interesting reading for someone in 2110.

Modern Fine Bindings

2009-09-07T08:53:00.014-05:00

This ESV Study Bible was commissioned by the publishers. Created as a presentation piece, the goal was simply to use elements of the published design (top photo) while creating something exquisite. It arrived as an uncovered textblock and was bound in heavily grained morocco with beveled and rounded boards, double-core headband in three colors, leather inner joints, and hand marbled endpapers. The lettering design of the spine was taken from the original, as was the use of the triangle as a design element. A marbled triangle is inlaid into the front cover , recessed below the leather, and the triangle theme is repeated in the gold tooling around the inner dentelles. A velvet-lined box was built to house the book and uses black morocco, wooden sides, and matching marbled paper. The publisher's logo is worked into its rounded spine. Several photos of a second copy commissioned at the same time follow.

Aged Headband Cloth

2009-07-21T20:08:00.006-05:00

I've found the last bit of a great cloth for making 19th century headbands. (Discontinued by the factory.) It features blue stripes and a stained/aged beige that makes the cloth look 100 years old; a perfect match for many books including family Bibles. It can be more deeply aged if needed, but looks great for many uses as is. It's 100% cotton, thin enough to form neatly over round or square cores (light shirt weight, not bed ticking). A 3" by 45" strip is $7 postpaid; enough for a lot of books. The top picture shows a similar cloth headband still attached with new material behind. The 2nd photo gives a sense of the stained/aged appearance. What's not easily apparent from the photo is that the "white" portions are not just beige, but have soiling and stains as part of the design. It's an unusual cloth; sort of like the ratty jeans so popular among today's callow and unkempt youth. If you'd like a much larger piece to make a pre-soiled filthy new shirt, just let me know. : )

Bookbinding and Bytes

2009-07-13T08:38:00.008-05:00

Visitors to our shop say it looks like something out of a movie or a Dickens novel: browns and blacks, old books and cast-iron machinery, the smell of leather and book dust. Most of our work is done the old-fashioned way using tools and techniques that Charles Dickens could have described. Not because we're distrustful of the new and shiny; there's simply no other way to do the careful sorts of work required by restoration and fine binding. Occasionally, a new tool comes along that becomes an important addition to our shop. In this case, it even uses electricity. Welcome the computer!

This important early edition of a Madame Curie work arrived in its original paper wraps with portions of the spine and covers missing. We scanned the covers, used digital magic to fill in the missing portions, and output on a similar paper. Finally, a perfect color match was achieved with the airbrush (another modern tool). Preserving Yesterday's Treasures with Today's Technology... sounds like an ad agency blurb, but in this case it's true!

Rebinding a Family Bible

2009-07-09T11:40:00.007-05:00

Our usual goal when restoring a family Bible is to reuse the original spine and boards. Repairs are hidden underneath the original materials and the book retains the look and feel of a period piece. When the covers are missing or unsalvageable, the best approach is not always clear. Because the sculpted boards and the blocked gold tooling are an irreplaceable part of the book's history, there's no easy way to recreate the look and feel of an antique Bible from the mid to late 1800's. While sculpting boards and having metal dies made for tooling is possible, it's fairly expensive.

These covers suffered heavy water damage, shrinking the leather and exposing large areas of the boards beneath. We were able to salvage the center portion of the leather, sculpt new boards to receive it, and suggest the correct period by a combination of blind and gold tooling.

It's far more common for the spine to be missing, and we face the same difficulties in matching intricate tooling without scanning the original and making new dies. Here's a recent effort that suggests the ornate original and blends well with the original boards.

The Springback

2009-06-24T09:45:00.016-05:00

We've had some interesting books in from a county archive dating back to the early 1800's. In addition to mending and resewing the textblocks, we rebuilt some very interesting historical bookbinding structures. The most unusual is the springback, which features a hard curved spine that wraps around the textblock. When the book is opened, the pressure of that curved spine board throws the pages open all the way to their inner margin, a great convenience for the clerk. When closing, the "spring" opens slightly and then as it flexes back shut, pulls the textblock back into that curved hollow. They are rarely seen today, and require a number of specialized reinforcements across the inner joints. We built a model years ago as a visual aid, but typically take note of how each book was built and simply copy the original structure as we rebind.

Besides the structural uniqueness (much of which remains hidden), many ledgers from this era feature beautiful leatherwork with extra colored panels and tooling, both in blind and gold.

Books on Bookbinding

2008-01-18T16:10:00.001-06:00

Here offered are a number of duplicates. There are only a few "must haves" if just starting out, but all are useful.
Jane Greenfield: Headbands, How to Work Them. Oak Knoll, 1990. oop (Hardcover, still in shrinkwrap) $25
Jane Greenfield: ABC of Bookbinding. Oak Knoll, 1998. oop. (Hardcover, dj, fine) $30
Einen Miura: The Art of Marbled Paper. Zaehnsdorf, 1990. (Hardcover, dj in mylar, vg) This edition has a tab between the bibliography and the Index in English with a tipped in sheet of handmarbled paper. $30
Laurence Town: Bookbinding by Hand for Students and Craftsmen. London: Faber & Faber, no date. (hardcover, ex-library stamps, no card pocket, very good) $20
A. W. Lewis: Basic Bookbinding. NY: Dover, 1957. (paper, very good) $5
Kenneth Perry and Clarence Baab: The Binding of Books. Meriden, CT: Kelsey Company, 1940. (Hardcover in mylar, very good, name on front flyleaf) $10
Shereen LaPlantz: Cover to Cover. Creative Techniques for Making Beautiful Books, Journals & Albums. Asheville, NC: Lark Books, 1995. (Paperback, very good) $10
Aldren A. Watson: Hand Bookbinding. NY: Bell Publishing, 1963. (Hardcover, dustjacket in mylar, very good) $12
John Mitchell: An Introduction to Gold Finishing. A Craftsman's Guide. West Sussex: Standing Press, 1995. (Paperback, very good but for rumpling to bottom corner of rear cover, not affecting text.) $75
John Mitchell: A Craftsman's Guide to Edge Decoration. West Sussex: Standing Press, 1993. (Paperback, very good.) $75
Philip Smith: New Directions in Bookbinding. NY: Van Nostrund Reinhold, 1974. (Hardcover, dustjacket in mylar, very good) $180
Faith Shannon: Paper Pleasures. The Creative Guide to Papercraft. NY: Grove Weidenfeld, 1987. (Hardcover, dustjacket in mylar, fine) $10
Adrian Wilson: The Design of Books. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1993. (paperback, very good) $10
Roy Harley Lewis: Fine Bookbinding in the Twentieth Century. NY: Arco, 1985. (Hardcover, dustjacket in mylar, very good.) $20

Hand Bookbinding Tools for Sale

2007-12-26T14:20:00.018-06:00

Email for photos of items not pictured.

Kwikprint Model 64 floorstand model, with crank for adjusting height. (Just like the 86 but with a floor stand.) Head swivels for titling spine or boards. Some surface rust to the upright, but everything works smoothly and tightly. New machines cost roughly $2400 (http://www.kwik-print.com/ or http://www.model86.com/) $1400. Pictures on request. (Send request to bob@gildedleafbindery.com)

Self-centering Typeholder. Bright brass and varnished wood by W.O. Hickok, Harrisburg. Accepts type up to 3/4" high, 5" line. $300

Self-centering Typeholder #1. Old brass, wooden handled, smooth operation. No name found. Accepts type up to 5/8" high, 5" long. $220

Self-centering Typeholder #2. Old brass, wooden handled, smooth operation. No name found. Accepts type up to 5/8" high, 5" long. $220

Flat Polisher, 2" wide. No handle. $50