I am pleased to announce the completion of my most recent binding, a copy of “Lines: Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey, on revisiting the Banks of the Wye during a tour: July 13th 1798″, or, in short, “Lines”. The book is a 2002 publication by The Old Stile Press of a poem written by William Wordsworth which is often abbreviated to, “Tintern Abbey” although the building doesn’t actually appear within the poem. It was written by Wordsworth after a walking tour with his sister in this section of the Welsh Borders on the banks of the River Wye. The abbey fell into ruin after the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 16th century.
Frances and Nicolas McDowall from The Old Stile Press actually live on the banks of ‘the Sylvan Wye’, about two miles upstream from (‘above’) Tintern Abbey. Taken from The Old Stile Press website:
“Having lived for more than fifteen years amidst 'these steep woods and lofty cliffs, And this green pastoral landscape', we felt the time had come to tackle the work that we have come to regard as 'our' poem.
We can almost see William Wordsworth's footprints on our riverbank. Even before we came to live here we felt a deep affinity with this poem. Wordsworth helped us to understand and to accept the 'sense sublime of something far more deeply interfused' of which we have always been aware. The images involved Nicolas editing photographs which had been taken on our stretch of the river but Frances too spent long hours at the vat to make paper for the entire project text, endpapers and binding.
Spring water on its way to the Wye is an essential part of this paper making process and plants grown beside that stream were used in the endpapers. Altogether a very personal project!”
The original cover of the binding pictured below:
Although there is no mention of Tintern Abbey by name in the poem, the title of the book is very specific. The whole point of the poem is the location and the time, it tells the reader exactly where the speaker is and exactly when it was penned. The influence of this bit of nature "a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey" had upon Wordsworth's development influenced the cover design I chose for the binding.
I searched for plans of Tintern Abbey online and found some wonderful architectural drawings that were published on March 22nd 1884 in, The Builder. The Builder was a journal of architecture published in the UK in the 19th and 20th centuries. It began publication in 1843 and absorbed another journal titled Architecture.
I chose to base my cover design on a plan I found of the “Detail of West Entrance”:
I decided to split this plan in half and tie the front and back covers together by using Lines (therefore directly relevant to the title of the book) to link across the spine. This design was then mapped out onto a piece of tracing paper to use as a master template for working on the covering leather.
I then went on to depict the “Jamb and Arch Moldings” from the West Entrance on the endpapers and doublures, the pattern of which was directly influenced by another drawing in the series from The Builder.
I outlined the shape of this architectural detail onto my endpaper and doublure and cut out the shape with a scalpel. I designed it so that the pattern would run across the endpaper and onto the doublure, this was mirrored between the front and back covers.
I wanted to fill in the ‘void’ with a striped effect, similar to the detail seen on the plan. At first I experimented with drawing lines with ink however I wasn’t pleased with how it looked so instead turned my attention to using gold leaf.
I adhered some gold leaf to very thin lens tissue (9gsm) using PVA glue. This was then cut into very small strips (around 1mm wide) with a scalpel.
These thin strips were then glued to a piece of Japanese paper using fine pointed Tweezers to help position them into place. I had marked out the outline of where I need to fill with a pencil, plus added in some guidelines so that the strips remained straight across the whole expanse.
I left one end of each of the gold leaf strips unglued as I wanted them to lay on top of the blue doublure/endpaper paper once stuck in place, in order to avoid the look of a straight ‘cut’ line this end. These were individually stuck down at a later stage.
The Japanese paper was stuck together with the blue paper and pressed. I used a paper template to position further cut paper detail on the surface and also to pierce through and mark points for a small amount of embroidered detail.
The paper for the endpapers was laminated to a gold effect handmade paper. I made sure that the embroidery I did on the endpapers was really neatly tied down on the reverse as I knew when these papers were laminated together the threads would be visible, as below:
The text block was only three sections and was made from thick handmade paper. The paper was an important part of the making process for the book itself as an excerpt from the Old Stile Press website explains:
To begin, therefore, with the paper. Of a purity so important to the process, ‘the waters’ taken and used by Frances were indeed ‘rolling from their mountain-springs with a soft inland murmur’, as they pass our house on their way to the Wye itself. Also the inclusions (Reed &c.) that give such character to the endpapers and the cover were all picked ‘on the banks of this delightful stream’.
I chose to bind this book using stubs as this was a good solution to dealing with the thick sections. I worked out the number of stubs I needed for the thickness of the book and sewed the book up onto four tapes. The endpapers were made to the full width of the book so no stubs were needed for them.
The text block was rounded and backed and the endbands were sewn. The spine was first lined with some Aerolinen and then a strip of goatskin which was stuck to the spine, skin side down. This was sanded flush and a two-off one-on hollow was attached.
The boards were laced on and back-cornered and the edges of the boards were all sanded to a long bevel.
At this point I was able to accurately measure the exact size of the leather and therefore the outer edge of the design. I used strips of suede that I had edge-pared from the back of miscellaneous skins using my Brockman paring machine. I don’t throw any of these away as I have discovered they work really well as onlays. I like the colour variation they provide and when backed to lens tissue this stabilises them well.
In particular for this design the suede onlays gave a great mottled look, in my mind mimicking the look of stained glass. They were stuck down to the covering leather through a template using PVA glue.
Once the onlays were stuck in place they were back-pared. I was then able to get on with the embroidery process. Initially I used the tracing paper template to prick holes through with my needle pricker to mark out the lines I needed to embroider.
Given the multitude of embroidered lines making up this design I did the initial linear work using my sewing machine to speed up the process.
Once these guide lines were in place I ‘whipped’ around each of these with threads of differing colours to add definition and colour variation.
Further embroidered detail was added using cotton and metallic threads.
I also added extra detail to the surface of some of the suede onlays using a fine-nibbed pen.
Once all of the embroidery was done I marked out where the brickwork was going to be by pricking around the outlines through the template. I was able to add some sewn detail onto some of the bricks at this point before the leather was glued onto the book.
Once all of the embroidery was complete the front of the leather looked like this:
And the back like this:
It was then time to stick the leather to the book - always the bit I find most daunting after spending so many hours working on it before it goes onto the book! I dampened the front of the leather using a water atomiser. Once damp I turned the leather over and applied paste. I did three applications of paste to make sure that it had absorbed well into the leather.
Once the leather was on and the headcaps had been formed I left the book to dry under a light weight for 24 hours changing the blotting papers regularly.
Once completely dry I applied a run of water to the spine joints using a water pen to dampen the leather at this point before attempting to open the covers. The covers were opened and the text block, along with the leather joints, were released from the paper and cling film wrapper that was keeping them away from the moisture created during the covering process. The leather joints could then be stuck down in position.
I had bought some gold wire that I wanted to attach to the boards on the topmost line of the abbey design. I blind-tooled a groove into the leather at this point using a gouge with the correct curve.
Small holes were drilled right through the board using my Dremel and a very tiny drill bit. I used these holes to anchor the wire to the front of the board using a thread.
The thread moved up from the back of the board, over the wire, and then back through to the back of the board to hold the wire in place.
Once the wire had been sewn on through the boards, the boards were infilled with watercolour paper. An additional layer of Zerkall paper was glued down and sanded to level out any bumps and then the finished paper doublure was glued down in place. Final pen detail was added to the onlays at this point.
I then spent time working on the bricks. I scored lines into the surface of the leather using a fine bone folder and a T-square in order to get them even and regular. These brick outlines were then marked in using ink to build up the pattern. The lines were also run across from the front cover design to the back to link both together.
I used variety of methods to illustrate the bricks; gold leaf stuck to leather (using glaire and heat to fix it in place), embroidery (French knots and stem stitch), suede onlays, leather onlays and blind tooling.
I wanted to add a title to the spine so punched circles out of the gold leaf-faced leather. This was then carbon tooled with the book title and stuck to the book spine.
Finally the book was blind tooled to add a decorative look to the book as a whole.
Once the book was complete it was time to photograph it in all of it’s glory!
I now do all of the photography of my bindings myself, and thankfully have a wonderfully light conservatory in my house in which to take these photos. Later this week you will be able to see more images of the book on my website here.
The book was housed in an oak box, with a simple ‘line’ and title on the lid which was tooled on coloured suedes and embroidered to match the book cover.
A detail shot of the front cover:
The endpapers and doublures:
The title page:
And in conclusion, an excerpt from the tail end of the book, penned by Nicolas McDowall:
The images, too, even of for some tastes they may lack the literalness that would come from drawings or wood engravings, are all derived, as is my won’t, from photographs…which were taken on our stretch of the river.
I have felt a deep affinity with this poem since youth, when I never for a moment imagined we would one day live here. I have always been a ‘lover of the meadows and the woods and mountains’, and it was Wordsworth who helped me to understand and accept the ‘sense sublime of something far more deeply interfused’ of which I was so profoundly aware, then as now.
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
Back in 2017, an International Miniature Bookbinding Competition was organised by the Hand Bookbinding Foundation together with the publisher De Buitenkant and Museum Meermanno. I have not posted the pictures of my entry because strangely, the pictures went missing in Louis’ photo archive and no matter how we searched, it just couldn’t be found.
Just last week, while Louis was compiling some photographs for his upcoming residency, he found my pictures. I was super relieved and happy that I did have photographs of this book documented.
This book measured 76 x 54 x 18mm. My book unfortunately was trapped in customs upon arrival into The Netherlands and did not make it in time for judging. However, it was listed in the Second Selection Round. This book is a permanent exhibit at Museum Meermanno in Haag.
The book was sewn on recessed cords. It has acrylic covers with acetate cut-outs of faces representing the individuals who lived on the island, interacting with each other. The boards are slightly translucent and you can see through both from the outside and the inside, where it also acts as the doublure. The transparency reflects on the fleeting moment of the existence of the community on that island. The endpapers are handprinted with the lower case ‘i’ for the island, and also an icon of a human. I made the box to match the binding, using primarily red and green as to match the prints in the book.
I am glad that this book can finally be shown. This is the 2nd miniature out of the 3 I have done so far. More to come, I hope.
Design Binding Commission - Singapore through 19th Century Photographs
Back in March this year, I started working on this commission for a dear customer, but my life went into a whirlwind of an upheaval. It was difficult to manage having a clear mind to work on a design binding, and having to sort out the toughest months in my life thus far. So I decided that I should pack it up and do it when I am at my best and my mind is clear.
As promised, I will show a weekly update of the work in progress, as my customer enjoys watching his book come along. And also, this is a chance for me to share about the process of how a design binding is done.
It is not often that the textblock comes nicely in folded sheets, unbound, from the printers. It almost always comes already bound, in the factory, by a machine. Then it takes some precision work, effort and a lot of slow careful heating to remove the factory binding. First the case comes off by gently cutting away the board endpaper, then with slow heating, the fly leaf comes off. I learned a very hard lesson to not pull off the tipped on fly leaf because it takes a whole chunk of paper off from the first folio of the first section. It will then be a tedious task to repair that. So instead of a heated tacking iron, I used a hair dryer to slowly heat it bit by bit, and ease it off slowly from the first folio. I enjoy looking at the textblock after all the nasty adhesive has been removed, and I have a nice clean spine to work on.
My initial idea for this book was to use rather bright colours in a kaleidoscope kind of way, but through these months away from my bench, I decided that this book should not have such a loud cover, for such an amazing collection of photographs of my country from the 19th century. I have decided to do something more 3 dimensional, almost as though the photographs are coming out at you. But subtle.
So first things first, the endpapers ideas have to be sorted out, endpapers decorated, prepared and then sewing will begin.
This week’s progress in the Design binding for the book “Singapore through 19th Century Photographs” is all about board structures. As my design idea involves a rather weighty front cover, I needed to make sure that my hinge is able to take the weight.
I am still working on the maquette and it is still very much as bare as it can be. The leather that I am using is just some small scrap pieces and will not be the same type and colour of the actual binding. Well, this maquette is all about structure, if it works, then the design comes in.
Even though this is a maquette, I cannot resist the temptation of making endbands. This was sewn using a silk thread that was toned in brown gradient colours and it turned out really beautiful. I need to make a note to buy all the colours they have available at the shop.
I was contemplating ideas on how I should hinge the boards when I came across a post on Pianel® by Benjamin Elbel. He will be teaching this method in his studio, next year, in Amsterdam. Unfortunately, I am too far away and funds are a little short to go for such a wonderful masterclass. More information can be found here.
So I asked Benjamin if I could have his permission to try this method and discover it on my own, by trying to figure out how a leather and brass rod piano hinge might work and look. He was really kind to allow me to do so. Initially, I laced in my base boards very tightly like how it would be if the book would have been covered in leather, but it turned out too tight and therefore I had to loosen the boards. It needed almost 3.5mm allowance from the spine. Then I tried to attach the hinged boards to the board that is laced to the textblock. The book would not open. It will only open to about 90º and the board remained standing upright. This will not work as my heavy front cover might force the hinge to open fully and the stress might eventually cause material fatigue and fail.
I then took out the hinge and attached it directly on the boards that are laced to the textblock. But adjusting the tension on the lace-in tapes, I managed to get a sweet spot where the boards will open to a full 180º with some allowance.
So the boards are now attached, notes have been written, about where covering should be done before attaching the lace-in and the outer board. Next step, the structural support frame that will hold the glass and the ornate frame.
Design Binding Commission - Week 4 & 5: The Failure of The Hinged Structure and the Eureka! Moment
In the wake of the disappointment of the failure of the first structure, I missed posting about the building of the Design Binding Commission last week. The hinged structure that I thought would work for this binding had its limitations and many problems arose even before I could completely attach the textblock to the boards.
This is the thing that many people do not see, that behind all the beautiful works of an artist, many hours of failed attempts, misdirected ideas and even wasted materials go into the creation of an amazing piece. People often equate art as an object, which also translates to the price they are willing to pay, but what they do not see, is the artist’s efforts and experiments before it becomes successful, very much like a scientist.
On Sunday night, insomnia kicked in, and I was unable to sleep. My mind was racing and at 2am, I had a Eureka! Moment. This happens a lot for me, and I usually get brilliant ideas when I am kept awake all night by my busy mind. With that, I woke up Monday morning and took apart the entire maquette.
I decided to try out the endpapers by using a natural sponge with pearl and silver acrylic paints. The inspiration for the endpapers come from the technique of how the photographs in this book were made: albumen printing process, also known as the albumen silver print.
As I needed the front board to be almost completely independent but yet very securely hinged to the textblock, I decided to sew the book on stubs. This binding is similar to a pillar binding, but instead of using metal screw pillars, the textblock stubs and the hinge for the boards will be sewn on.
The whole binding process has to be done in reverse, now that it includes a lot of structure building outside, which does not allow for the book to be pressed.
I am happy for that Eureka! Moment. For now, my hands need to be busy, since my brain has already done most of the thinking work.
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
✓ Live Streaming✓ Interactive Chat✓ Private Shows✓ HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch • No registration required • HD streaming
A Great Start to the Year of the Dog: Venus Explor’d
Happy Lunar New Year to all that are celebrating this special day around the world. It is the year of the dog and it is my year. It has been a great start so far, with my first miniature commission, received by my customer, Neale Albert, who is a collector of miniature books in New York, and hearing that he loves it.
Venus Explor’d is an entire book of black and white photographs. I was toying with the idea of keeping the book monotone, but after reading the quotations that accompanied each photograph, I gained some inspiration.
This final design was not exactly what I had originally envisioned. It gradually transformed to what it is. One of the quotations was “This is the porcelain of humankind...” by John Dryden in Don Sebastian. Which lead me to wanting to create a fluid form, a softness and translucency to bring out the beauty of the female form, the soft skin on a woman, and the pinkness that lies beneath it, of the warmness of her blood and her touch. I also wanted to create a sort of “lost in the galaxy” effect, or looking out at space and the beautiful colours caused by the energies that surround the beautiful planet of Venus.
This binding is made with laminated attached boards, with a leather-joint doublure that extends beyond the boards and “turned-out” onto the outer sides of the covers, in white kangaroo leather. The endbands are hand sewn with white Japanese silk and the edges of the book are left pure white. The endpapers are made with a blend of alcohol inks on translucent paper and folded over so that the colours overlap and can be seen through when placed up in the light.
The covers of Venus Explor’d is a resin tile, mixed with alcohol inks of the same colours as the endpapers, swirled and poured over the handwritten title using Chinese ink. It took me many tries to get the resin to a correct thickness and consistency and I do enjoy that there are some air bubbles trapped within it. It adds to the specks of black ink, giving the covers a three dimensional effect, with the floating bubbles, fixed in place.
The box I made for this binding is a basic two tray drop-back clasmshell box. However I made a little tab so that the book can be lifted up from its recess.
I did enjoy the process of making this book and the exploration of the materials and techniques. I took a little longer than necessary, but I am glad that I have “landed” on Venus, happy and sound.
Designer Bookbinders International Bookbinding Competition 2017: Heroic Works - My Entry [Book of Coma]
I remembered very well the whole process of looking for the ideal book for the theme of “Myths, Legends and Heroes” for the Designer Bookbinders International Competition last year. I wanted something that was unique and was never produced before and not something that we are all so familiar with. I approached Michelle Yu from The Gentlemen’s Press and asked if we could collaborate and create a book for this competition. Michelle showed me the original drawings for Book of Coma and I was really excited.
Though it looks like a normal accordion or Concertina book, it works as a side-to-side codex which allows you to look at the book in a linear way through the concertina, or scene by scene which is connected in the centre. Michelle did a wonderful job making sure that in both ways, the illustrations are seamlessly connected and creating 2 narratives.
I just received my certificate just this week, and the book was chosen for the touring exhibition in UK and probably in Europe too. It is featured in the catalogue among many other wonderful bookbinders from around the world. It is quite an achievement for me because back in year 2013, when I first started training to be a fine binder, I told myself that I will make it a point to be in every single catalogue hence forth, and maybe evetually win a prize. Looking forward to the next competition in 2021.
I will be posting up a small animated clip of how the book works in the codex method.
To A Skylark by Percy Bysshe Shelley
40 x 55 x 9mm
This little miniature is currently touring the United States of America, along with the selected books from the Open•Set Bookbinding Competition. I entered this as my entry for the Open category of the competition.
To A Skylark is a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley about the poet singing praise to the skylark and its beautiful voice and song, comparing it to various beautiful things such as sunsets. The design of this binding is inspired by the description of the brilliance of the skylark songs in the hues of the purples and pinks seen at dusk. It radiates outwards from the center of the book, like the skylark’s song, spreading out its beauty to the far reaches of the earth.
Single edge gilding on the top edge, as well as the fore edge and tail of the endpapers in gold and the gold leaf is allowed to fall into the pages to represent the golden notes that descends from the skies onto earth.
Hand-dyed fair goat leather, with hand sewn Japanese endbands and hand coloured endpapers. Tooling on the boards are done free handed and it represents the fireflies that fly among the tall grass.
