back to basics
March 6, 2010
Yesterday I taught a small beginning bookbinding workshop. Participants made models of three simple book forms: a single signature pamphlet binding, a Japanese 4-hole binding and perfect binding. Here are some of the finished samples:
Because we have no bindery equipment here, I brought up this somewhat primitive trimming apparatus that my dad made for me back in the 1990s when I was doing a lot of bookbinding but didn’t have any money or any tools. Propped up on one end (the end you can see here, with blocks under it to keep it steady) a pair of backing boards can be slid inside and the book clamped for rounding the spine. At the other end it’s got a nice high smooth wooden wall that’s used for a guide to keep the blade nice and straight for trimming the clamped book; it uses an old blade from a plane with leather wrapped around it, and back when I was trimming twenty textblocks a day with this thing I’d wrap my hand in leather and fabric as well and still get blisters in two lines across all four fingers. It’s a grueling job, but it does the trick.
Using this old trimmer again has me really looking forward to getting the new (to me) Chandler & Price paper trimmer up and running once I’m back home (remember how I was going to get the base sanded and painted over the February break? Didn’t happen). Did I mention that I’m planning to spend my whole summer down in the basement just cutting up books all day? Any books I can get my hands on. Because I can, that’s why.
Posted by jodi on March 6, 2010 at 9.08pm
