A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean by Captain Cook

We happened to have three sets of three-volume-set Cook's Voyage in the bindery from different clients, so I thought it might be of an interest to you to see different editions of this well known publication. I'm posting two of them here.

This particular one is a 1785, second edition of A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean, by Capt. James Cook (vols. I & II.),  and James King. (vol. III), printed by H. Hughsm for G. Nicol and T. Cadell (London). It was bound in full pasta espanora leather with stone marble endpapers. For these volumes, I was asked to insert all the missing maps, thus consequently, I had to redo the previous binder's re-backing job. (It's because the thickness of the books would expand due to the inserted maps.) As for the spine lay out, I had no choice but to "recreate" what the previous binder tried to do because I didn't know how the original spine of this particular edition of Cook's Voyage looked like. So, I dyed the leather to match the boards, and did facsimile labels based on the few original labels left by the previous binder. Also, to replace the cheap n' ugly machine made headbands that he/she used, I examined the folds of signatures to find out the original colors of sewn headbands, (which turned out to be red and green.) and sewed them. Other restoration involved replacing the internal cloth hinges and minor repairs on the edges and corners.

This is a 1784 edition of A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean, by Capt. Cook, Clerke and Gore, printed by W. & A. Strahan for G. Nicol, published by T. Cadell. (London) It was bound in a quarter leather with a beautiful french curl marble and a humble set of green sewn headbands. The client asked for a minimum restoration on these volumes, so the restoration involved here was re-hinging on front hinge for one, partial hinge repair on another, recreation of a missing skiver label, and repairs on the corners.

Sawn sewing holes

One of my dear YouTube subscribers contacted me regarding the use of a saw to create sewing holes on the spine. Somehow, someone else has risen similar questions as his before, so I thought I should as well share my answers to his questions here, in case someone out there is also wondering about the same thing.
NOTE: The "Q", the questions, are the exact phases given to me, - copy/paste-ed on purpose.

Q: Why do you saw-cut the holes for stitching so deep? 

A: It isn't deep. It might appear to be deeper than that of an awl due to the visible incision of the outer sheet of a signature. - The saw cuts through to the inner most layer of sheet in a signature, while the awl would pock through to it. So, the depth of the hole is basically the same in both cases.

Q: Doesn't that (deeper outer-layer incisions) affect the pages inside?

A: No. But, you don't want the incision to be too radical (especially for a normal size book), or the glue might get inside the pages and the holes might become too visible when the book is opened. (ugly!) So, it's very important not to put too many sheets in a signature, (relative to the size of your book.) and important to consider the weight of the paper you are using, and that each sheet of folded paper is tightly jogged to the fold, so to minimize any unnecessary depth of incisions. Also, do make sure to check how deep you need to saw to get to the inner sheet before you start sawing, or the incisions on the outer layers of sheets could become unnecessarily too deep.

Q: I've been stabbing holes in my signatures but the sawing looks so much easier.

A: Needless to say, no professional bookbinder would poke holes one by one by hand, simply because it's time consuming and it isn't precise, (etc). Also, sawing by a saw allows each hole to have a minute width (of which depends on the width of the saw teeth) so that the thread wouldn't catch the paper around it. And, the width of the holes is necessary for various cord-sewing.

Q: Could you use a knife instead of a saw?

A: Yes, but I wouldn't recommend it. If you just create simple cuts by a scalpel or an Exacto knife (etc.), the hole is too tightly closed and doesn't have a comfortable opening to accommodate the thread, causing an excess "flare" of paper inside the pages (like the look of a flower.) as the needle and thread are going through it. So, if you really need to use a knife, make each incision in a slight "V" shape. - Make an incision in a slight angle, and trim the other in an angle. (The second diagram on the graphic. It's hard to see, but incisions are cut in V shape.) But, I wouldn't recommend using a knife because of its inconsistency of lines, depth and cleanliness, as well as the time it takes to do it perfectly. In conclusion, there's no need to use a knife unless you have no choice but to use it. :-)

The Holy Bible by A. J. Holman, 1877

It's been almost two years since I started this blog, and I thank all of you for your continuous support and having given me such generous comments and encouragement about my work. I would have never imagined that my blog would attract so many visitors, let alone would gain 79 followers!?

Out of nostalgia, I was checking the works I've posted on my blog over the couple of years, and noticed there were posts that were incomparably more popular than others. Naturally, posts that contain my videos have attracted many visitors, but amongst the very popular ones, Holy Bible by A. J. Holman & Co. has proven to be a great interest to many. A. J. Holman & Co. is an American Bible publishing house from Philadelphia that was established in the 1870's, and had produced many of the large Family Bibles in this country. So, there are lots of folks whose families own a Bible by them. (I'd say, about the third of large Family Bibles we handle here, rather than portable personal ones, are by this company.) So, I decided to post another A. J. Holman with a different design, here on my blog.

This one was published in 1877, and has the owner's name custom-embossed on the front cover. The restoration on this Bible was a straightforward re-hinge, replacement of the internal cloth hinges, repairs on the edges and corners, some paper mending and the reproduction of family record pages.

A matter of honor

NOTE: I'd like you to know that this was bound / created over a decade ago by an amateur, - me. So please don't be critical about the workmanship. :-p
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I think it was back in 1998~2000 when I somehow decided to make a miniature book out of scrap materials that were scattering around on my work bench. I used to spontaneously do those non-work related things just for fun or to regain focus on actual tasks I was assigned to do. I had a tiny bit of scrap leather that I dyed to antique for a job, and a small block of notepad that we made out of excess paper of blank journals that we had to bind previously. Out of those scrap materials, I bound a 2"x 3" (5cm x 7.5cm) miniature blank book with a small piece of an antique marble paper that was discarded from a book sometime ago. I still had a big enough piece of the leather left, so I also made a full leather slipcase with the same marble paper inner lining for the tiny book. I dusted the edges of the text block to make the book look older, too.. (Stupidly and meaninglessly meticulous? I know... haha..) Anyway, the bottom line is, this whole thing meant nothing other than me taking a break from work. I nonchalantly placed it on the corner of the display table the following day, behind the array of other normal-size books, and forgot about it, completely. 

I was writing a reply to an email from a bookbinder friend of mine, Mihai, in the backroom yesterday when my master gingerly approached me, and asked me how much I'd want for the small book I made years ago. What small book? It took me a moment to recall what it was, and it also took me as a surprise that anyone could find it on the table, let alone wanting to purchase it.. Well, because I'd never thought of selling it, I couldn't put a price on it, needless to say. So, I asked the man who wanted to buy the tiny book how much he'd pay for it. 

$25, he said. :-)

You see, I would have been more than happy to give it away because this tiny book really meant nothing to me, and it had been forgotten for over a decade in the first place. I would have given it to him because the workmanship on the tiny leather bound and slipcase isn't the greatest as it was a work of an amateur, after all, that I couldn't possibly charge him for. (I started an apprenticeship in 1997, by the way.). But, most importantly, because he liked the book. But, somehow, I got curious as to how much it would worth to him, and decided to ask him. I heard the number, 25 bucks, and he said he didn't know it was in leather, and because it was so tiny and he thought it was something like he'd find in a common gift shop or rather, he thought the price was adequate. I found myself saying no to him, then. It's totally understandable, really. In a modern world we live in, if I didn't know anything about this craft and/or the field of antiquarian books, et al, I would probably have said the same thing. It just looks like a tiny decorative object that a grandma would keep in a glass case shelf along with tiny miniature porcelain dogs and cats. But, something reflectively made me stop from giving this book to him, for free or not. 

I know it's definitely NOT because I was offended by the number, or anything like that. I'm not that sort of assertive or proud S.O.B. Then, what was it? This question has been occupying my mind since he left, and I came to a conclusion that I must have instinctively felt let down by the fact this age old craft with prestigious history was actually compared to some insignificant run-of-the-mill products. I guess I just simply wanted this tiny book, whether or not it was done by the master or the amateur, to be with someone who could appreciate this craft that I love and respect.

NOTE: This man was very nice, polite and amicable. This whole thing has nothing to do with his character.
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UPDATE: 10/23/2013
**This miniature blank book has a new home!**

One of my binder friends through my blog told me she really liked it. So, I'm sending it to her. It'll be flying over the Pacific Ocean tonight~~. :-)

A few bad apples ...

A regular client of ours, Easton Books from Mount Vernon, WA, dropped off a 9 volume set of The Writings of Thomas Jefferson awhile back, asking us to repair rat damage on the spines of two volumes, and a brand new facsimile binding for one volume. If you are a book restorer, you know inquiries like that, wherein every volume except for one or two is in perfect condition, so as to restore only the few damaged ones without making them look out of place amongst the set. Yeah, you know, The Bad Apple restoration. It's actulally a very tricky thing to do, to say the least. Especially, these particular bad apples were difficult, mainly because of the kind of leather I'd have to imitate and seriously heavy molding on one volume, which has infected all the way through to the middle of the book. Naughty, absolutely naughty. So, I had been putting this work aside, and letting myself wait till I felt "right" and mentally ready to tackle it. But, about a week ago, the client called and asked us to finish it up because they wanted to take the set to the annual Antiquarian Book Fair.

So, here they are. I finished them last night, at last. I did all my best to make them look as invisible as possible and naturally blended in among the other volumes. I hope the client approves my work.. and hopefully it'd find a new home during the book fair. **

This is  The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, edited by Henry A. Washington, published by J. C. Ricker, Taylor & Maury in 1856.

Sophocles : Oedipus Coloneus, 1885

We've had an unusually dry, spectacular summer this year, but it looks like the rain is catching up with our luck. An introvert like me wouldn't mind a gloomy rain, in fact, I'd rather prefer it to a persistent glare of sunshine. But, it appears that all the debt of rain have concentrated in the last few days and it's been pouring like a crazy river with a strong gust that resulted in flood and fallen trees in some parts of our state. I heard there was a tornado here today as well... Tornado!? It normally doesn't happen here. I hope no one got hurt... What an insane weather it's been, though... So, I've been leaving all the craziness outside and cocooning myself with a calmness of dusty old books in this century old basement.

This book I chose to work on came in several months ago and has been on top of our backlog list for quite sometime. So I have been fully aware of this book, - not that I had forgotten about it or anything. What the client asked us to do is to create a brand new leather spine with facsimile gold tooling, as the condition of the original spine leather was deteriorating to the point when it was touched, it fell apart. The reason why I have been putting this book aside until now was because I wasn't one hundred percent sure how to deal with the former restoration. As you see, it had been rebacked and hinged previously with the original spine leather glued back on. For some reason, I just couldn't decide whether to leave parts of the visually obvious previous restoration as is and restore the book accordingly, or rid all of it in order to set the base to a default so that I could make my restoration work seamless and wouldn't look obvious. Anyway, I chose the latter because it's the right thing to do despite of the difficulty of matching the leather perfectly to the pasta española. I had series of tools that were pretty similar to the original, so everything went smoothly after having made up my mind about the direction. (The removing and cleaning of the previous restoration of superficial internal cloth hinges was nasty though..)

This is Sophocles, the plays and fragments, Part II. Oedipus Coloneus, by Richard C. Jebb, published by Cambridge University Press. (London, 1885) The restoration involved a rehinge with custom-dyed leather, facsimile gold tooling, internal cloth hinges and restoration on the edges and corners.

Cruise of the USS Dolphin, 1831

One of our returning clients dropped off this book last December and asked us to create a brand new leather binding with a custom design on its cover. Master had been holding this work for several months due to his preoccupation, but decided to entrust me with it back in June-July. When it comes to custom designs, most of our clients already have particular and clear designs they want, so all we have to do is to simply "materialize" it for them. But this work was different. The client had very vague ideas as to how he wanted it to look; however, he was certain that he wanted the design to be very simple and somewhat abstract. - Art Deco-like, yet to represent the subject of this book in some way. (like using a harpoon, whale, ship and ocean etc...as the basis of the design.) Humm... you see, it took me a while to get myself into his mind and precisely come up with the design that he had envisioned. I was so relieved that he liked the design I submitted very much. (whew!) As much as I admire old fashioned Rococo-Victorian designs in binding as a binder, I also adore Art Deco. So, it was actually fun to brain storm in sketches and visualize his wish. He won't be able to pick up this book until December, but because it turned out to be exactly the same as the design that I showed him in graphic, I think he'll like it. One thing I kinda regret is that I didn't use a smaller wheel for the curved lines, so the lines became a bit inconsistent. But hey, they are supposed to be waves, so shouldn't slight wobble be alright ?!? :-p
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UPDATE 11/02/2013 : The client later requested for a custom slipcase with a matching marble inner liner, so I just added the picture above.

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This is Journal of a Cruise of the United States Schooner Dolphin, by Hiram Paulding, published by G. & C. & H. Carvill. (New York, 1831.) The restoration / rebinding involved a complete resewing, recreation of a frontispiece map, a sewn upper headband and a new full leather binding with French curl marble endpapers and a gold tooling of the custom design.

The Innocents Abroad, 1869

 

It's rather embarrassing to say, but I've never read The Innocents Abroad, Twain's most popular work, featuring the narrative of his travels in Europe. I'd certainly enjoy his humorous cynicism and ironical observation of the unjust contradictions that the righteous would proudly justify, and his timeless critique of the all-too-human society. But I haven't read it. I feel like an illiterate fool. If the client of this book was reading this, he'd certainly be disappointed!

And boy, was I disappointed in the previous restorer of this book. I put the pictures up here, so I don't think I need to point out what I don't like about it in detail, but the strange and sloppy patch-up job on all four corners and the hinge with an unmatched material which needlessly got broken prematurely made me let out a big sigh for sure. Depressing as hell. Anyhow, I re-did what was supposed to be done in the first freaking place, but there are always some sort of problems when it comes to fixing someone else's job, that makes my job imperfect, which pisses me off big time. And the crap he/she left underneath had to stay forever. Don't I just loath it.

Anyway, as you can sense from my whiny rant above, I'm not in a cheery mood lately. Sorry about that. It's just that I'm under pressure and stress that I thought I should let it out a bit.. sigh..

Smollett's Don Quixote, 1755

There's a strange yet rather frequent phenomenon in the bindery that we jokingly call "psychic clients", wherein the client of the book that we are JUST about to work on would call to check the status of his/her book. It's actually scary! It's as if I'm sending some sort of a "telepathic signal" to them unconsciously, or they are sending me one so that I would pick their books to work on. ahhh..

The book featured in this post is one of them. I was digging out orders (books) which were 6, 7 months old, and I picked a couple of them and placed them on my workbench. As I was wondering which one to work on first, the phone rang, and somehow I knew who it was.... AHHHH!!

Anyway, this is a two-volume set of Smollett's Don Quixote. (1755, First Ed. London) It required re-hinging and reconstruction of the top and bottom of the spine, as well as facsimile sewn headbands and repairs of the corners. Also, a part of a skiver label was missing, so I created a patch, on which I re-tooled so that it appears as if there was never a missing piece. It's always difficult (often impossible) to lift the original spine leather without cracking for re-hinging when it's glued to the spine of the book, (called tight-back.) and this wasn't an exception. It was, as always, a nerve racking task. There's a young, preteen boy (I think he's 12.) who visits the bindery at night occasionally when his parents are working in the building. He showed up when I was at a critical point of lifting the spine leather, and just couldn't possibly be interrupted. But, he started running around the room and talking and laughing loud and all.. Ah,, you know what I did? I yelled at him.. I feel horrible.. I have to apologize to him next time I see him... :-(  But for now, just for the sake of it, I'm sending him my apology, telepathically. hummmm f.o.r.g.i.v.e. meeee ~

Homemade Beeswax !

I recently acquired a big chunk of honeycomb from a friend of mine after asking him to spare me some honey that he makes. (He's a beekeeper, painter, sculptor, tattooist, chocolatier, organic food maker, a building contractor, certified hemp crop grower (it's legal here.), a yoga instructor and soon to be a daddy. Amazingly, he does everything full time successfully.. Yeah, you go figure.. Don't try this in your country though,,, or you'll end up living on the street. Only in America, guys...) When I saw the honeycomb, I was at a loss of words, but soon realized that I could use the darn beeswax in the bindery! He told me how to separate the honey and beeswax, so I tried it. And here's the result! It sure looks usable, but I think it has a trivial amount of honey left in it that might be an issue for an actual use for my clients' property. So for now, I'm just keeping it aside and planning to test it in the future.
On the side note, I might travel to Germany next month with a renown bookbinder from New York. I may write about it when the plan actually solidifies. 

Holy Bible by M. Carey, 1815

This is an 1815 edition of Mathew Carey's King James Bible. (Not the so-called The Carey Bible with the Douay-Rheims translation.) The original cover was in a horrible shape, so the client wanted a new facsimile full leather binding for it. It's just a simple new binding work, but I decided to post this here because of the custom leather dyeing work I've done on this Bible.

Like many others since I started this blog, one of my dearest regular visitors of this blog, Huhu, inquired of me about my leather dyeing technique earlier this month. I haven't gotten a chance to respond to her via e-mail yet, but as I've always told everyone, what I can say is basically the same; I can't really explain my exact leather dyeing technique over the internet first of all. Every dyeing work I do is unique to the particular job I'm working on and every leather reacts differently to a different dye or chemical. So there isn't really a fixed text-book instruction I can give to anyone. All I can advise is to experiment with the medium that's available to you, and I just hope that people would see my works as a reference, in order to innovate their own unique techniques. :-)

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, 1798

No sooner had I returned from a week long trip to Canada than I had to leave town again for another week. So, I've been juggling things a bit frantically lately, which is the reason why I've been absent from my blog this month. As I've so far managed to post something every month since I started this blog little over a year ago, it just didn't feel right to miss this month's post. So, I brought a camera with me today to take pictures of this binding that I just finished.

This is a part of Vol. 88 (1798) Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, written by George Atwood, for which he was awarded a Copley Medal. This Atwood's thesis section was separated specifically from the original journal, so it needed a new binding. The client asked for a quarter leather binding with marble paper and a set of simple gold lines on the smooth spine, along with the author's name and the publishing date stamped on the bottom. I had to resew the book with five cords, so it would have been more fun to bind it if he asked for raised bands on the spine. But well, a simple gold lines on a smooth spine seems more traditionally accurate when it comes to academical periodicals of the era. So, the book collector client always knows best.

I dye, antique or mottle leather for most of my bindings, but I left the leather untouched for this particular work. It's sort of rare for me not to alter the texture of leather even a little bit, so I decided to post it on my blog.

By the way, in case you are interested in science and mathematics, PDF archives of all the Philosophical Transactions issues from the very first edition of 1665 are available online here for "A", (mathematical, physical and engineering sciences), and here for "B". (biological sciences)