Gauffered Edges, Double Headbands, Marbled Endpapers and So Much More...
The true artisanship of the bookbinder is showcased in cabinet 11, where features such as gilt dentelles, gauffered edges, double headbands, marbled endpapers, molded borders and watered silk doublures appear on titles such as The magazine of art, Les chefs-d'oeuvre de la peinture Italienne, Rhododendron: bilder aus den Schweizer Alpen and Nouveau formulaire de prières dédié aux enfants de Marie.
Cabinet 11
Les Chefs-d'oeuvre de la Peinture Italienne. Paul Mantz. Paris: Librairie De Firmin Didot Freres, Fils et Cie, 1870 Green-dyed morocco with exquisitely decorated front and rear boards. Outer hand-tooled border of five parallel lines, followed by a single line border and then a further gilt and black stamped floral border, broken at the corners and sides by a single square or rectangular embellishment. Inner, oval-shaped decoration consists of gold stamped leaves and scroll-work, highlighted in black ink. Gold embossed initials, F.D, also appear in decorative panels on the front and rear cover; presumably a reference to Librairie de Firmin Didot. (Didot was a French printer, engraver and type founder). Six-compartment spine with gold-stamping to each panel. Blind tooling either side of the five raised bands and gold tooling over the top of the bands. Ornate dentelle edges and exquisite, multi-coloured endpapers in the swirled, nonpareil pattern. More photos...
Curator's Collection
Australian Dictionary of Dates and Men of the Time: Containing the History of Australasia from 1542 to May, 1879. J. H. Heaton. Sydney: George Robertson. 1879 Red patterned grain sheepskin over slightly bevelled boards with hand-tooled gold border to cover, plus decorative gold debossed title and floral vignette surrounding a dated hourglass. Six-compartment spine with hand-tooled lines highlighting the raised bands and hand-stamped floral motifs to each panel. Dentelle edges with marbled endpapers in the nonpareil pattern. All edges gilt. Binders ticket to front paste-down reads: “Bound by C. Jerrems. Sydney.” Note: this bindery is still in operation. It is now known as Jerrems Binding Services and is based at Marrickville, NSW. Jerrems Binding has been servicing the printing industry since 1878. Today they are specialists in guillotining, book and sheet collating, stitching, trimming, drilling and scoring. More photos...
RB 993 H44
The Magazine of Art. London: Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co. Undated but circa 1895 Olive green cloth over bevelled boards. Cover title debossed in gold and surrounded by leaves and flowers of the Art Nouveau style and further enclosed by decorative stamping and gold rules. Top, tail and fore-edge gilt and exquisitely gauffered (also known as goffered) in a similar stylised leaf pattern. The gauffered edge is achieved by first gilding the page edges, then impressing or rolling a heated brass finishing tool, with a decorative pattern, along the edge. More photos...
RB 708 M18
Nouveau Formulaire De Prières dédié Aux Enfants De Marie. Paris/Lille, J. Lefort, Imprimeur, éditeur A. Taffin-Lefort, successeur impremeur de monseigneur l`archevêque de cambrai. 1845 Custom-dyed, patterned grain morocco. Three separate hand-tooled decorative cover borders. The first of these would have been created with a hand-held roll, with a triangular pattern around its circumference; the second, with a hand-held fillet with three parallel lines; the inner floral border, with probably also a patterned roll. The six-compartment spine, with its genuine raised bands has also been hand-tooled with decorative gold borders and the title blocked, probably letter-by-letter, with individual brass stamps. The edges of the front and rear boards have been hand-tooled, as has the head and tail of the spine. Equally elaborate, hand-tooled dentelle edges highlight plum-coloured watered silk doublures. Double headband. Top, tail and fore-edges first marbled, then gilded. The near fine condition of this book can be attributed to its custom-made slip case and additional protective sleeve, marbled in the nonpareil pattern. More photos...
Curator's Collection
Als der Großvater die Großmutter Nahm. Ein Liederbuch für Altmodische Leute. (As Grandfather Took Grandmother: A Songbook for Old-fashioned People). Leipzig: Friedrich R. Wilhelm Grunow. 1887 Cream cloth with a delicately interwoven floral pattern. Intricate gold debossed border to cover and head and tail of spine, plus floral endpapers and matching slip case showcasing the finesse typically associated with German binders of the era. All edges gilt. More photos...
RB 831.08 A46
The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs. William Morris. London: Ellis and White. 1877 Green-dyed morocco with gold-tooled and blind-ruled borders around central stamped embellishment. Six-compartment spine with genuine, raised bands. Hand-tooling either side and on top of the bands. Gold debossed floral decorations to each panel. Elaborate dentelle edges, gold-tooled board edges, all edges gilt and marbled endpapers in the classic bouquet pattern (also known as peacock pattern). The bouquet marble pattern was created towards the end of the 18th century. It begins first with a nonpareil base, before a comb with two sets of teeth is drawn vertically through the base in a loose, wavy manner which causes the nonpareil columns to fan out, creating a kind of “bouquet”. More photos...
RB 821.85 M877st
Memoirs of Joseph Shepherd Munden, Comedia. Thomas Shepherd Munden. London: R. Bentley. 1844 Full green-dyed calf binding with decorative hand-tooled gold border to cover and intricate gold blocking to six-compartment spine with raised bands. Contrasting red leather spine and publication date labels, also debossed in gold. Elaborate dentelle edges and gold tooling to board edges. Marbled endpapers with gold vein printed over plum-coloured Spanish moiré (waves) on a Turkish pattern. Double headband. Top edge gilt. More photos...
THEATRE 92 M965
Chips from the Earth's Crust; or, Short Stories in Natural Science. John Gibson. London: T. Nelson and Sons. 1894 Pictorially illustrated blue cloth with a delicately blocked title. Cover illustration, stamped in black and gold, depicts a section of a Cornish copper and tin mine. Spine title blocked in gold, with further black embellishment highlighting the first letter of each word. Pictorial spine image reflects a worker descending a ladder into a mine. Blind embossed decoration to rear cover. More photos...
Curator's Collection
Rhododendron: Bilder aus den Schweizer Alpen. Gustav Closs and O. Frölicher. München and Berlin Berlin: Friedrich Bruckmann’s Verlag. Undated but circa 1880 Dark green pattern sand-grain cloth over bevelled boards. Blind stamped outer border in the geometric style; additional gold border encompassing six more raised, molded borders with elaborate corner embellishments. Central gilt vignette depicting rhododendron flowers and leaves. Cover title, in the elegant German style, blocked in gilt over the illustration. Ornate spine decoration incorporates the initials F.B; undoubtedly those of publisher, Friedrich Bruckmann. Note: This book provides an unusual example of the ways in which cloth and leather have been used together. The cloth-covered boards have been laid over a patterned grain, green-dyed sheepskin spine. Also, the German binder, R. Gerhold has stamped his name and place of work (Leipzig) into the decorative gold borders at the base of the front cover.
Curator's Collection
Maoria: A Sketch of the Manners and Customs of the Aboriginal Inhabitants of New Zealand. Captain J.C. Johnstone. London: Chapman and Hall. 1874 Green-dyed half calf binding with exquisite marbled sidings in the Spanish moiré (waves) pattern. The seemingly three dimensional wave which appears to ripple across the cover is created by rocking the paper across the marbling bath as the paper is laid onto the patterned liquid. Also with decorative gold hand-tooling to the six-compartment spine and gold-stamped lettering to complimentary brown leather spine label. Marbled endpapers and edges, both in the Spanish moiré pattern. More photos...
RB 572.9931 J73
Maxims and Precepts of the Saviour. Illuminated by Henry Noel Humphreys. London: Longman & Co. 1848 Black morocco over heavy wooden (probably oak) bevelled boards. Hand-tooled gold border to front and rear cover encapsulating a papier-mâché style decorative overlay. Cover panel (probably card) is stamped in relief with ornate decorations and hand-coloured in red, green, blue, grey, black and gold. Title blocked on cover in both upper and lowercase letters and in gold and relief. Spine title blocked in gold with decorative debossed ornamentation at head and tail. Intricate dentelle edges, marbled endpapers in the swirled nonpareil pattern and all edges gilt. Publishing house label to front paste-down reads: “Deighton, Bell & Co., Cambridge, Eng.” Note: Deighton, Bell & Co. continued to operate out of Cambridge until 1998, when it was sold to publishing partners, Dawson Books.
RB 226 ZHU
The History of Australasia: From the First Dawn of Discovery in the Southern Ocean to the Establishment of Self-government in the Various Colonies: Comprising the Settlement and History of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland, Western Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand, Together with Some Account of Fiji and New Guinea. David Blair. Glasgow, Melbourne, and Dunedin: McGready, Thomson, & Niven. 1879 Original crimson full leather (probably sheepskin) patterned grain binding over bevelled boards. Gold rules and debossed decorative borders to front cover enclosing hand-stamped blind leaves and flowers, plus a gilt coat of arms with an emu and kangaroo. Six- compartment, gold-blocked spine with debossed gilt title to second panel. Faux raised bands. All edges gilt.
RB 994 B63h
The Poetical Works of Thomas Moore, Complete in One Volume. Thomas Moore. London: Longman, Brown, Green and Longmans. 1850 Dark green patterned grain morocco over heavy wooden bevelled boards. Beautifully blind blocked on front and rear cover with a repeating floral border surrounding a further geometric pattern, comprising individually hand-stamped decorations. Six-compartment spine, showcasing genuine raised bands and additional blind hand-stamping. Spine title debossed in gold, dentelle edges, handmade silk headband, plus blue silk ribbon marker. All edges gilt and gauffered. Front paste-down stamped: “B. West Binder. St. James’s Wk. Clerkenwell“. More photos...
RB 821.75 M824
