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‘bookbinding’ Category

  1. Bonus // Bookbinder of the Month: Sonya Sheats

    June 30, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    oiseaumendelssohn-sonyasheats

    Photo by Brandon Constant

    Les Mémoires de L’Oiseau Mendelssohn by Monique Lepeuve was bound by Sonya Sheats in 2005 and was her first polycarbonate binding made during her first apprenticeship with Edgard Claes in Belguim. It tells the story of a bird by the name of Mendelssohn, who introduces the reader to the incredible characters in his family.

    This style of binding is referred to as “À Creneaux” and is archival in the sense that no glue or paste is applied to the text block. The signatures are sewn directly to the PVC spine with monofilament and could safely be removed by simply cutting the monofilament. The hinge between the polycarbonate covers and PVC spine is made from a spring-loaded watch pin.

    Sonya talks about her process for creating the airbrushed covers:
    The painted covers were done using two different processes. First, I applied four coats of paint with an airbrush (red, blue, white, and yellow ochre), and while these coats were all still wet, I took a steel brush and lightly scraped the paint. This created the fine bamboo-like grain of the design. Second, I used a series of templates to mask portions of the covers and airbrushed feather-like forms in shades of purple, circles in purple and lime, and black contour lines throughout the design.

    oiseaumendelssohn3-sonyasheats

    Photo by Brandon Constant

     

    oiseaumendelssohn2-sonyasheats

    Photo by Brandon Constant 

  2. Bookbinder of the Month: Sonya Sheats

    June 30, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    MadrigalTranstromer

    When Harold Pinter was award the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2005, the Nobel Museum (located in Stockholm) began a collaboration with the Swedish Bookbinders Guild to offer an annual Nobel Museum Bookbinding Exhibition. Their goal has been and continues to be to give bookbinders an opportunity to work together with contemporary writers. An archive of past exhibitions are also available on their site. 

    In 2012, Sonya Sheats bound Madrigal by poet Tomas Tranströmer, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. Published in 2010, the text includes linoleum prints by Birgit Alm-Pons and was printed in a numbered edition of 50 (Sonya bound copy 13). Her binding was awarded honorable mention in the exhibition and was on display at the Nobel Museum alongside a biographical exhibit about Tomas Tranströmer from February to June of 2013. 

    Sonya’s binding is a true quarter binding structure. I’ll let her words describe the rest: 
    The spine is quite interesting. It is made of natural goatskin. The width of the leather spine piece is equal to two times the width of the spine. The hollow extends onto each board by approximately 0.5mm (one quarter the thickness of the true spine) and is attached to the boards by 0.5mm turn-ins on each side. Add all that leather up and you will get two times the width of the spine. The boards are a mosaic of zebra wood with inlays in birch wood. End sheets are tan Silsuede, and the book is encased in a shaped birch slipcase lined in Silsuede.

  3. Bookbinder of the Month: Sonya Sheats

    June 23, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    pictorialwebster-sonyasheats

    Photo by Brandon Constant.

    In 2010, the New England Chapter of the Guild of Book Workers exhibited a series of juried design bindings for Johnny Carrera’s Pictorial Webster’s: A Visual Dictionary of Curiosities. As a project that began in 1996, Carrera patiently sifted through a collection of around 12,000 engravings from the Merriam-Webster Company that are now housed in Yale’s Arts of the Book Press room in hopes to create a visual dictionary inspired by the Illustrated Webster’s. Carrera’s Pictorial Webster became available to the public as a trade edition in 2010. Original letterpress copies were bound in several different styles from full leather to oak boards to full cloth. Additional copies were left unbound and made available to bookbinders.

    Sonya Sheats was amongst the binders selected for the NEGBW exhibit deFINEd BINDINGS hosted at the Bromfield Gallery in Boston, MA. Bound as an open joint binding and sewn on water snakeskin and vellum tapes. The spine is white and black snakeskin and the covers are MDF and walnut veneer with dyed walnut onlays. The binding fits snuggly inside a shaped walnut slipcase. Sonya’s binding was awarded “Best Binding Structure” by North Bennet Street School. 

    A comment from Sonya regarding the structure of the binding: 
    Looking back, I do not think I would use an open joint structure on a book this thick. The covers essentially hang off of the book by the sewing tapes, which are hidden in a sort of de Gonet style with the dyed wooden onlays. Because of the hefty appearance of the walnut, I think it works here, but in general, I think of this structure as quite delicate and lanky. 

    pictorialwebster2-sonyasheats

    Photo by Brandon Constant.

  4. Bookbinder of the Month: Sonya Sheats

    June 16, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    5Conjugations

    Photo by Brandon Constant

    5 Nouvelles Conjurations by Pierre Mrejen was bound by Sonya Sheats in 2010 and is the smallest book she’s ever bound at 8.5cm x 7cm (3.3″ x 2.7″). Bound as an open joint binding sewn onto eel skin and vellum tapes. The spine is brown goatskin with polycarbonate boards covered in frog skin and décor in snakeskin. Each cover uses one full frog skin.

    Sonya’s use of exotic skins has become a signature in her work and one of the reasons why I love her bindings. 

    BovaryRose

    Photo by Brandon Constant

    Sonya originally bound this copy of Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert in preparation for a décor class taught by Florent Rousseau. However, Sonya was displeased with the work she did and immediately reworked the binding once the class was over. Sonya cut off half of the buffalo on each cover and replaced it with new leather of a noticeably different grain. To hide the seam between the new and old leather, Sonya pared salmon skin to a lace-like thinness and place them over the seam as an onlay. The seam was still quite noticeable, so Sonya blind tooled a decorative fillet over the salmon.

    A comment from Sonya: 
    This book is the one that I receive the most inquiries about on my website and in my studio. It draws the most attention for some reason, though it was made from a series of impulsive decisions. All of the shades of pink and bordeaux come straight from the illustrations inside.

  5. New Items in the Herringbone Bindery Etsy Shop

    June 11, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    newetsyitems

    During a recent workshop, I revisited the Gary Frost sewn-board binding structure. Remembering how much I enjoy that structure I decided to bind a few for my Etsy shop using the same series of paste papers as the previous collection of books. Each sewn-board journal is filled with 48 blank Mohawk pages and accented with book cloth on the spine and board edges near the spine. 

    Check out Herringbone Bindery at Etsy. 

    sewnboardpurplecheetahHand Bound Sewn-board Blank Notebook // Grey Cheetah – $25.00

    sewnboardmountainHandmade Sewn-board Blank Notebook // Mountain – $25.00

  6. Bookbinder of the Month: Sonya Sheats

    June 9, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    bienaimeraymond-sonyasheats

    Photo by Brandon Constant.

    Bien Aimé Raymond by Max Jacob with illustrations by Jean-Marie Queneau was bound by Sonya Sheats in 2007. This was Sonya’s first open joint binding using MDF and wood veneer. Sonya refers to this binding as an open joint because the covers are attached by the snakeskin and vellum sewing tapes, leaving an open (or empty) joint between the text block and the boards. It is a cased-in binding that is based on a structure that was used by Otto Dorfner in Germany in the early 1900’s.

    The covers are a dyed birch veneer with a dark blue Oasis goatskin spine. The endpapers are brown Silsuede and a brown Nepalese paper.

    bienaimeraymond2-sonyasheats bienaimeraymond3-sonyasheats

  7. Bookbinder of the Month: Sonya Sheats

    June 2, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    paperradpoly-sonyasheats

    Photo by Brandon Constant.

    Paperrad was an artist collective based in Boston and comprised of Jacob Ciocci, Jessica Ciocci, and Ben Jones (all fantastic friends of Sonya Sheats). Their multimedia projects use “lo-fi” visual aesthetics, bold fluorescent colors, and images from popular culture.

    In 2006, Jacob visited Sonya in France. Paperrad’s first book, BJ and Da Dogs, had just been published and he brought her a couple copies. Sonya had just finished her first apprenticeship with Edgard Claes and was about to return to Belgium to continue her studies. Jacob and Sonya thought it would be a good idea to bind Paperrad’s book, so he designed the cover while in France, and Sonya brought it with her to Belgium.

    This edition had been previously bound after publication, so Sonya dismantled the text block. To hide some wear left on the outer folds of the signatures, Sonya glued strips of fluorescent papers onto the folds. The structure for the binding is referred to as “À Creneaux” with an open spine in polycarbonate assembled in sections and PVC. The signatures were sewn with monofilament and exposed along the spine.

    A comment from Sonya:
    It will forever be a running joke between Edgard and me because he was quite shocked and unsettled by the colors in the Paperrad design. I hung up prints, templates, and color samples around my workspace, and Edgard joked that he had a hard time looking in my direction during that time. It took me about 22 hours to make 7 templates for the color blocks and to airbrush the design [with automotive paint]. 

    paperradpoly2-sonyasheats paperradpoly3-sonyasheats

    The interior of the boards were also airbrushed, one in lime and the other in a soft blue.

    paperradjourdan-sonyasheats

    Bound in 2005 for Paperrad, BJ and Da Dogs is this full embossed leather binding with colored foil tooling for the title. Below is another edition bound as an open joint binding with buffalo skin.

    paperraddiamonds-sonyasheats

  8. June // Bookbinder of the Month: Sonya Sheats

    June 1, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    lacouleurduvent-sonyasheats

    Photo by Denis Larocque.

    La Couleur du Vent is a collection of poems by Gilles Vigneault, illustrated and designed by Nastassja Imiolek under the artistic direction of Cécile Côté. Sonya Sheats bound this copy for an international design binding exhibition organized by ARA-Canada and the École Estienne in Paris. The exhibition is currently on display in Paris until it travels to Quebec and then to Montreal. The exhibition is also viewable online at ARA-Canada: La Couleur du Vent. 

    Sonya bound this edition as an open joint sewn with tapes made out of vellum and box calf, spine is tanned calf skin with onlaid bands of muted green and taupe water-snake skin and one band of red calf skin, boards in MDF and walnut burl veneer, and onlays in lace wood and calf skin. The subtle accent on red comes straight from the illustrations in the book.

    While finishing my second year at North Bennet Street School, Sonya was invited to teach my class the simplified binding structure, a technique she learned from Sün Evrard. Initially, I had the pleasure of meeting Sonya during an open studio event in Cambridge. I was able to tour her space and handle many of her bindings. I am very intrigue and captivated by Sonya’s clean design and level of skill. I would like to thank Sonya for taking the time to share her experiences and skills with me through this interview

    Read the interview after the jump and come back each Sunday in the month of June to read more about Sonya’s work. 

    read more >

  9. North Bennet Street School // Student & Alumni Exhibit 2013

    May 30, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    At the annual Student & Alumni Exhibit for North Bennet Street School, the 2013 graduating Bookbinding class* showcased their design bindings for the set book The Periodic Table by Primo Levi. The text is largely a memoir of the years before and after Levi was transported to Auschwitz. Through a set of chapters titled after elements on the periodic table, Levi recounts his Jewish community in Italy and his life as a student and young chemist; exposing how life’s pleasures can resist and endure in the face of tyranny.

    studentalumni-kevinsheby

    Kevin Sheby bound his edition in black goatskin with hand-dyed goatskin onlays, tooled with palladium. The title and author are also hand tooled in palladium. Edges decorated with graphite and irregularly gilt with palladium. Kevin finished off the inside covers with black goatskin doublures and sunken ebonized veneer panels.

    studentalumni-jeannegoodman

    Jeanne Goodman covered her binding in full navy blue goatskin with sunken hexagon panels on either cover displaying two illustrations from the text. Each illustration is created through the use of several decorative techniques including feathered onlays, tooling in blind and gold and surface gilding in palladium. A tooled double border in gold runs along the outer edges of the covers. All three edges are gilt in gold and the interior is finished with handmade graphite paste papers.

    studentalumni-katrinakiapos

    Bound in full black goatskin, Katrina Kiapos, accented her design binding with a minimalist, geometric design. Three onlays in shades of black and grey mirror each other from the front and back covers. Katrina hand tooled the title and author in palladium. Edges decorated with graphite and sprinkled with palladium. The interior is covered with black goatskin doublures and leather flyleaves.

    studentalumni-betsyroper

    Betsy Roper bound her design binding in full hand-dyed goatskin. The skin was dyed to have a mottled look, creating texture and movement. Various hexagons are placed on the front and back cover, both protruding from and sinking into the boards. Title hand tooled in blind. Edges decorated in a soft brown tone. A marbled paper accents the island paste down and flyleaf.

    studentalumni-averybazemore

    Avery Bazemore created a design to reflect the chapters of the book, emphasizing the section about gold with a surface gilt square onlay on the front cover. The book is bound in full grey goatskin with additional onlays in black goatskin. Title and author were hand tooled in carbon. Head edge decorated before sewing in graphite; Avery again emphasizes the chapter in gold by gilding that particular section of the text. The single line continues onto the headband and headcap. The interior is finished off with leather doublures.

    studentalumni-laurenschott

    Covered in full dark green goatskin, Lauren Schott created a design binding reminiscent of the Art Deco era. Hand tooled gilt lines run the height of the front cover, wrapping around the spine, board edges and back cover leaving the outline of a hexagon. The title and author were also hand tooled in gold. Edges decorated with graphite and sprinkled with gold leaf.

    In addition to student work, a small handful of alumni work was also on display.

    libraryofbabel-colinurbina

    Library of Babel bound by Colin Urbina in full brown goatskin and hand tooled in a repeating hexagon pattern. A single hexagon is gilt on the front cover. Edges decorated with alternating shades of brown and chartreuse green.

    libraryofbabel2-colinurbinawhitman-samfeinstein

    A full leather rounded spine clamshell box from Samuel Feinstein. The front cover has a built-in window to house a printed portrait of Walt Whitman in addition to a gold tooled border along the frame.

    shakespeare-celinelombardi

    The Complete Works of Shakespeare bound by Celine Lombardi in full red goatskin. Titling and cover design hand tooled in gold. Each title on the spine is linked to a tab on the foredge of the text block through a corresponding gilt line.

    alumnicase-erinfletcher

    There are four great pieces on display in this case. On either corner are two of my bindings: Fantastic Mr. Fox and James and the Giant Peach. Last year, Marie Oedel paired up with book artist Laura Davidson (whom I interviewed on my blog in April) to make custom boxes for her book Every Nib. Lastly, is Celine Lombardi’s Murmurations, a small edition printed and bound during her year long fellowship at The Center for Book Arts in New York.

    * Nancy Baker’s set book was taken from the exhibit before I could photograph it for this blog post.

  10. Book Artist of the Month: Susan Collard

    May 20, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    smallmuseum-susancollard

    In 2010, Susan Collard created her smallest book to date with a wide range of materials including birch aircraft plywood, basswood, slate, various metals, mirrors, linen thread and a shell. Small Museum of Nature and Industry is a bit fatter than a perfect cube with dimensions of 2″ x 2″ x 2½”. This tiny structure opens up to a series of compartments to reveal a set of building blocks and concealed brass rods, as well as wooden and aluminum pieces. The unraveling architecture and hidden components of this book are quite surprising.

    Once the materials and title were determined, Susan set out to create a book with the open-ended complexity of a miniature museum. This artist book received a Juror’s Award during the Pop-Up Now! exhibit at the 23 Sandy Gallery. 

    smallmuseum2-susancollard smallmuseum3-susancollard

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  • My name is Erin Fletcher, owner and bookbinder of Herringbone Bindery in Boston. Flash of the Hand is a space where I share my process and inspirations.
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