I started bookbinding as a hobby more than 40 years ago. I took evening classes at Leicester Polytechnic (which had recently taken over the Leicester School of Printing, along with its specialist bookbinding staff) in 1976 and continued for five years. Trevor Hickman was the tutor – sadly he died a couple of years ago – very highly respected by all his students. Over the next 25 years I gradually acquired all the tools, equipment and materials necessary to tackle any repair or new binding job, and I joined the UK-based Designer Bookbinders, and later the Society of Bookbinders. Their weekend courses and conferences were important to developing my skills. Initially I bound or repaired just my own books, but people began to ask me to do repairs at which , with practice, I became quite proficient. When I retired from full-time work I took on more repair work and now, fifteen years later, my work book has over 2000 entries, including some new bindings for clients. Now I would like to share some of the techniques and methods I have developed with other binders, however new they may be to the craft, and that is the chief aim of this Blog.
After the last post, about finding an unusual ‘scabboard’ binding, a reader asked to see the finished article. So here is a series of pictures of the rest of the process, with suitable captions.
So there it is. Rare ‘scabboard’ material of the boards now invisible. But I will tell the client all about it.
The Rebindery 