#sample books

Decorative Sunday

This Sunday we present a selection of original paste papers by New York paste-paper artist Claire Maziarczyk from Maziarcyck Paste Papers by English book-arts author and fine-press printer Claire Bolton, published in Oxford, England at Claire and David Bolton's Alembic Press in 1991. The book, printed in a limited edition of 175 copies by Claire Bolton and quarter bound in cloth with Maziarczyk's paste paper-covered boards (first image), includes nineteen samples of Claire Maziarczyk's paste papers, with descriptions of how they are made. The text also includes a history of paste papers and notes on the range of patterns used.

After varied experiences as an elementary school art teacher, a teaching technician at Cooper Union, and a bookbinder and administrator at the New York Center for Book Arts, Maziarczyk began making paste papers in 1982 to create decorative sheets for book covers. She soon began to make production paste papers to be sold to bookbinders and art supply stores. This led to a commission from Red Ozier Press to produce some custom designs for their book covers. In 1985, she began to use paints made by Golden Artist Colors that had a wider range of colors with more intense shades and a range of metallics that didn't oxidize. She kept adding more and more patterns to her repertoire and by the time this book was printed she had 48 papers of different patterns.

Our copy of this book is another donation from the estate of our late friend Dennis Bayuzick.

View more posts of paste papers.

View other books from the estate of Dennis Bayuzick.

Do you remember the colour of your house in 1966? Was it one of these single colours, or perhaps the suggested colour combinations? Fashion Gold, Rattan, or Sage? Pumpkin or Blue Lagoon?

 It is reported that "Resene have pedalled paint since Stipplecoat was invented in Eastbourne in 1946". Resene was the first company to introduced water-based paints to New Zealand, in the 1950s.

Stipplecoat Products Ltd (Seaview) :Resene exterior and interior super-gloss enamel [Colour chart inside spread. 1966]    

Decorative Sunday

Last week, we brought you black and white images of 16th century to the early 19th century European decorative lace work from La dentelle ancienne, style et technique by the German lace scholar and collector Alfred von Henneberg, with a foreword by the German art historian Wilhelm Pinder, and published in Paris by the decorative arts publisher A. Calavas for the Librairie des Arts Décoratifs in 1931. This week we present all the color plates from this volume demonstrating the various standard patterns used to make lace designs.

Click on the images to see the captions.  The patterns shown here are called “bud,” “shell,” and “toilé.” The patterns are connected to each other with thread designs known as “brides,” which may be simple or extended. Other terms in the captions are fond de neige, a pattern found in Binche lace, a type of bobbin lace that originated in the town of Binche, Belgium, and “pillow-work,” lacework that is created using the surface of a pillow as its ground.

View more decorative plates published by A. Cavalas, Librairie des Arts Décoratifs.

Decorative Sunday

These 15th- and 16th-century lace patterns are from the early 20th-century publication La Dentelle, transformations progressives XVe et XVIe siècles published in Paris by Édouard Rouveyre (1849-1930), father of the noted French caricaturist André Rouveyre. La Dentelle is part of the decorative design series Comment discerner les styles enseigné par l'image and includes 500 black and white photographic examples. Our copy was originally part of the  Albert F. Gallun Library of the Layton School of Art, the predecessor institution of the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design.

View other posts on lace.

Decorative Sunday

This week we present some plates of French, Italian, and Belgian decorative lace from La dentelle ancienne, style et technique by the German lace scholar and collector Alfred von Henneberg, with a foreword by the German art historian Wilhelm Pinder, and published in Paris by the decorative arts publisher A. Calavas for the Librairie des Arts Décoratifs in 1931. Click on the images to see the captions. 

The book presents 181 color and black and white plates of manufacturing techniques and lace examples from the 16th century to the early 19th century. Today we are only showing the black and white plates.

View more decorative plates published by A. Cavalas, Librairie des Arts Décoratifs.

Decorative Paper Sunday

I’ve been excitedly waiting for this specimen book to make its way through processing and into our catalog so I can share these gorgeous decorative papers with you all. I hope some design nerds out there will share my enthusiasm. The book is A Specimen Book of Pattern Papers Designed For and in Use at the Curwen Press, published in London for the Curwen Press by The Fleuron Ltd. in 1928 in a limited edition of 220, containing 31 samples of pattern paper, with an introductory essay by artist and Curwen collaborator Paul Nash. 

From Nash’s introduction:

The papers in the following Collection are from designs reproduced by offset printing, the original key pattern being a line block from a drawing, or wood engraving … The latest designs are mostly from blocks engraved upon wood, sometimes with another colour applied either flat or grained. This notable output by an English printer is another sign of the steadily growing conviction that distinction of design is not only aesthetically, but commercially important. Every article, from the Shopman’s showcard to a motor-car, must have economy and beauty of form. It is a lesson we are learning very late, but if we can learn it intelligently, and not like parrots, we may yet recapture what has been so long lost with us, a pride in style. 

Typography Tuesday

ANNA SIMONS, PART 3

Last month we presented the 20 numbered plates from Titel und Initialen für die Bremer Presse, a specimen book of the titling and initials by the German calligrapher and type designer Anna Simons (1871–1951) for Willy Wiegand’s Bremer Presse, printed letterpress in Munich at the Bremer Presse in an edition of 220 copies in 1926. This week we present the remaining unnumbered plates from this portfolio set.

View more posts with designs by Anna Simons.

View posts on other Women Type Designers.

Decorative Sunday

Japanese Pattern Book

This week we present pages from the first of a two-volume, traditional Japanese fabric-pattern sample book, Orimon Zukan by Rinō (or Rindo) Fujii, published in Kyoto in 1898. As prosperity grew in the early Edo Period of the 17th century, a fashion-conscious audience developed and flourished, leading to the publication of the first pattern books, hinagata-bon 雛形本, in the 1660s. Designs were inspired by a wide range of sources, including the natural world, folklore, history, signs of the zodiac, auspicious symbols, and literature. These early works were printed using traditional woodblock technology in black and white, often including notes describing the intended color and type of fabric. 

This novel type of publication proved very popular and they continued to be produced into the 20th century. As color printing became more sophisticated, so did pattern books, and by the late 19th century, publishers, led by Kyoto-based firms, were collaborating with noted artists to produce a range of sample books from which clients could choose their preferred colors and fabrics, such as the example presented here.