from the bindery: the devil's bindery, or, if you were a book cover, which would you be?

as part of my quest to pay more attention to the 50-100 books that might pass through my hands per week, i've been keeping a list of bizarre and humorous book titles and setting bindings aside for scanning and photographing. below is an assortment of titles from the 1880s to the 1940s that came from a librarian for consideration to be commercially bound. this librarian is trying to aid me in my quest to keep my bindery prep students busy, but i looked at much of what he sent down and thought--what a loss to lose these original bindings. and all in the name of keeping me busy. i won't rebind most of the ones shown below because they are in too much disrepair to go to the commercial binder.

so. i love these covers and i love the titles. i wish you could see the tables of contents inside some of them or read these funny, mystifying stories. there is something charming and amusing and so odd about American and British culture at the turn of the last century and into those first decades. it is a quality that seems totally lacking in our world now. i don't know what it is. all i know is that i absorb a little bit of it each week at work as i dive back into the book culture of the time in search of sympathetic methods of repairing these little buddies. and in search of tidbits about book manufacturing of the time that fascinate me.

while the practical demands of my workplace cannot be met by approaching the zillions of books that come our way with a strict, conservation/restoration approach, it's a shame to me to lose these covers: these books in their whole, original form--and especially through their cover designs and materials--preserve and communicate so much about the world that created them.

so, take a look. thanks to the call number stickers, you can see the publication date on most these titles. any titles without a date in the call number are first editions. the last few titles come from the tale-end of the last awesome and ever-so-eclectic phase of the victorian publisher's binding-o-rama. i like these the best of the lot, but i'll wait to say which is my favorite until i hear from some of you which are your faves....

the following are identical editions but with very different covers.

from the lab: more than a ghost from my past

Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier. this, i thought, would be a fine read for october. mysterious, romantic, eerie and full of suspense. a book i had read only once before about 14 years ago.

so i pull up the Lee Library catalog, jot down the call number on a scrap of paper, and take myself down the hall and up a couple flights of stairs to the southwest section of the 5th floor.

there are several copies to choose from. i begin to pull each one down from its place on the top shelf and flip through its pages and wiggle its covers, checking for overall structural soundness, seeing if i like the feel of the pages, the look of the type, the thickness of the book. (yeah, my usual ritual. nice to have so many copies to choose from).

oh, but what do we have here? one of the copies has been re-bound by book repair. you can always tell book repair books by their solid-colored cotton and rayon cloth cases and new labels (done on indesign and printed on moriki paper--for those of you binders interested in these details).

hmm. i wonder who repaired this? i'll just flip to the back and check.

lo and behold! there my initials were, staring right back at me, with the date 10/2002 written to the side. seven years ago, to this very October month, i had disbound this book, stab sewn on new endsheets, recased it in this teal green cloth, and lightly signed my initials in pencil on the bottom lefthand corner of the back cover!

naturally, i became the 19th person in 7 years to check this copy out. this 1941-er has held up quite well over the years, despite needing a little more tlc.

a missing or uber-damaged page i had photocopied and replaced. it's still stuck in there nice and tight. (the textblock is stab sewn all the way through, ps.)

hmm. some taped pages (among many) i chose to ignore. the tape doesn't appear to have evolved much, which is good. the paper overall is quite fragile. reminds me of the way a well-loved and used baby blanket feels over the years: thinning as it begins to fade.

i finished reading this book Sunday, on my flight home from the Guild of Book Worker's conference. tho it has withstood yet one more reading, there are numerous tears along edges of many pages, and some graffiti here and there, along with evidence of pencil marks i had erased in my former life as a book repair employee who didn't want to be a bookbinder. while reading it, i enjoyed not only the mystery in the words of the story, but the tactile story of the book object, itself. i reflected on the importance for me of working on circulating books--books that are used, books we are keeping functional and usable. i loved being able to feel how this book had been used and held and read by others. likely i am the only person to have returned to this 1941 Sun Dial Press copy of Rebecca more than once. it's come back to me: a ghostly remnant of my 2002 self going through the motions of a job, earning money meeting my solid 2009 self, striding with purpose through each day as a bookbinder and repairer of books.

from the wilderness: life outside of bookbinding

while i continue procrastinating my book-related posts, here's how i've been spending time the past few weeks.

september and october are some of the best times of year for wilderness excursions in utah. leaves are changing color, it's dry, and temperatures are cooler.

all summer, pear, sue, and i have completed a series of planned hikes. summitting mount baldy, on the face of Timpanogos, was our last for the season. the hike began in Pleasant Grove's Battle Creek Canyon where we discovered little paradises of waterfalls, meadows, and forests of firs.

even the top of Baldy was intriguing. we discovered that the north side is wetter and covered in firs, while the south side supports a much dryer climate, boasting only ankle-to-waste-high scrub oak. pear called it "mountain patterned baldness" or something like that.

while hiking across meadows on the face of Timpanogos and getting these views was my favorite part....

....the hike down became the hike from hell. thanks to some woefully misguided trail information, we ended up hiking/sliding/tumbling down the south face of baldy. it was by far the steepest descent i've ever done, and i spent a good deal of it crouched down and sliding on my feet. 2 hours of straight down left the three of us totally physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted. we felt triumphant for making it, but i look up at baldy now and glare in its general direction.

Nebo Loop: views behind Mount Nebo.

since returning home from Boston, i've been trying to do things here I've never done my whole life growing up here. Driving the Nebo Loop and exploring Payson Canyon is one of those things. The terrain is much different than that behind Timpanogos along the Alpine Loop.

For one thing, the dirt is red! This is "The Devil's Kitchen". It's the Nebo Loop's own tiny Bryce Canyon.

The aspens were changing color right along with the maples. Mixed in with the evergreens they were amazing!!

back slope of Nebo.

Capitol Reef National Park

This was the perfect day to visit this park! Pear and i left provo at 7 am, and 2 hours and 45 minutes later we arrived at one of my favorite places on earth. Temperatures below seventy, dry, sunny, limited crowds. perfect.

View of the waterpocket fold geologic formation from our hike to the Golden Throne.

the Golden Throne. it was perfectly silent here. and along the way we found places that echoed so well off the slot canyon walls that you could hear your whole echo come back to you.

our second trail was the 3.5-mile loop around Chimney Rock.

nope. the camera isn't tilted. it's the natural slant caused thousands of years ago by a ripple and fold in the land.

just one example of the rainbow of colors at capital reef. the strata alternates from red to green to purple to white to yellow. a camera will never, ever do this justice, so just imagine it. or better yet. go there!

(so stay tuned. books will be back as soon as the outdoors is no longer available.)

seasonal chiasmus

today life is in chiasmus...


rain and cooler weather,

sprouting greens--spinach, lettuce and arugula

new beginnings at a new semester on campus

a season of plants and shrubs growing tired,
giving off their last exhale in a building burst of color....

i drift back with my memories to september and october's seasonal opposites, march and april

a season of plants and shrubs waking up,
breathing their first fresh breaths in a building burst of floral color

graduation marking new beginnings at the end of a semester on campus

sprouting greens--spinach, lettuce, and kale

rain and warming weather


spring and fall. at once so alike, yet moving in opposite directions, preparing for different tasks. they, in their own extremes, temper the more exuberant extremes of winter and summer.

and for a moment the world rests in equilibrium at the equinox--balanced light and life--before swirling along its expansive, ever-changing way

From the bindery: welcome to book repair

It occurred to me that part of The Q Lab should actually include the lab at work (or as we tend to call it--the shop). Not only does book repair zap most my bookbinding time, efforts, and energy, but i also come across some crazy, kooky stuff (stay tuned for scans from the 1968 bowling guide...), including fine examples of how NOT to repair a book.

so in commemoration of the pending fall (and therefore the end of the gardening season and the return of the bookbinding season)..........welcome to Book Repair.

this is the corridor of needy books that greets one at the entrance to book repair. (and yes, that blinding light at the end of the tunnel is heaven! we have the best light in the library, ps.) the books on the left are divided by floors and await subject selectors' decisions on which to repair and which to replace or withdraw. i spend a good chunk of time managing these shelves, keeping books stacked well, weeding out quick repairs (like a simple page tip-in), and chasing down librarians to get them to come review their books. while these are all books from the circulating collection rather than special collections, we still do a fair amount of 19th century books, which often tend to be either half-leather bindings sewn on cords with their front and back boards coming off, OR, dilapidated cloth-case bindings with the worse paper ever. love it.

once librarians make their decision, my boss and i check off what repairs the books need and put them on the repair shelves on the right, where students grab them. the 15 or so book repair students are all divided into floors and work with a team leader to get the work done. thanks to their hard work this summer, we cleared out the book repair backlog for the first time in years (maybe ever). i try to get students interested in and motivated to do big, odd projects (like giant atlases) but am not always successful. this summer, tho, everyone went on a split board kick, so we are getting some big books out of the way.

here's some of the equipment we have around the shop.


this is the corner o' machines. in the center you'll notice a nice, new guillotine, fully automated, including safety sensors that won't allow the blade to drop even if you are leaning in just a bit too far. Next to it on the right is a sander, and next to that the coolest , biggest stapler ever. on the left is a drill.

here's a closer look

this drill can hole punch an entire ream of paper if need be. the drill bit is lowered by foot pedal.


stapler up close. flip on the switch, press the foot pedal, KA-CHUNK! there's a little lever on the left that you use to set the staple length, so you can staple a ream of paper if you want to. there is also a saddle attachment so you can staple folds. we don't use this much, but it's fun when we do!


paper, leftover stock from stuff we don't do anymore, and binders board fill these shelves.


buckram leftover from days of yore. (for those unfamiliar, buckram is that thick, plastic-y cloth that library books are bound in) this is excellent old-school buckram some people might really like to get their hands on. we almost never use it since most the items that would be bound in buckram (like periodicals) get sent to the commercial bindery in SLC.


some rolls and pre-cut squares of starch-filled C-cloth and paper-backed cloth. flat files of japanese paper, silicon release paper, and some handmade papers.


more flat files (can't remember what's in them), plus scraps (looking a little messy). we're getting better at saving scraps that are actually useful, but every once in awhile, i find a scrap in the shelves that is a tiny sliver of cloth. same problems never go away....


paper-backed book cloth! would that we had had all these colors at school!


making new cases is one of the main things students do in book repair. we like to match the new cover to the old as much as possible......


......so having the full rainbow is helpful. and fun!


years ago, my sister pear made this guide on how to cut cloth economically. somehow it's ignored more than it's adhered to. whenever cloth is cut badly and wastefully, we say it's been murdered!


this is one of my favorite machines--the adhesive binder! in this photo, it's set for a flatback binding, but we have different shapes and sizes of curved attachements which allow you to put the round the book. much easier than jogging the book together by hand, putting in the round using a paper towel role, and then--pinching it with all your might so nothing moves--somehow dropping it into a standing press. the adhesive binder rounds and clamps all in one. (altho i'm glad i've done it the other way, too)


sinks and giant tupperwares for humidification chambers. we haven't had a flood for awhile, but when i was a student, we helped clean up over 1400 books after a flood.


fume hood, kwikprint, and some presses. the fume hood is almost exclusively used when we spray krylon on our new paper labels to seal the ink.


my bench.


view of the shop from my bench. there are 14 benches, and right now we have 15 or 16 employees (not counting three who are on study abroad). students hale from all over the U.S. and from Slovakia, Russia, Kenya, Mauritius, Uruguay, and Columbia. it's been an interesting experience teaching and training people who are not interested in becoming bookbinders. i've loved teaching students more about why we do things the way we do, and encouraging them to keep asking questions, questions, questions. some days i'm so harried and wish i had an office to just step out and away from it (i feel bad now, for the times i bugged mark in his office at school..:)); other days are calm and quiet, and i can catch a moment here or there to continue experimenting on some new variation on a repair.



some of our standing presses. the one on the right is the oldest. we have four total.

check out our awesome rack. about 15 years ago (or more), a book repair student designed these press inserts for a class project so that students could back their books and then move them to the rack to dry overnight. this frees up the presses so more people can back their books, and the workflow doesn't get stalled. ingenious!


here's a close-up of the inserts in action. just tighten the wing nuts, loosen the press, and carry your book-in-insert to the rack.


the last work station in the shop includes the label-making and bindery prep computer stations. students use the mac at the end to make paper labels for new cases. we use Indesign and match the original labels' fonts and looks as much as possible. you can see how the newly cased books on the shelf are color-coordinated so that the student can fit as many labels as possible on the matching piece of moriki paper.

the 2 bindery prep students work for me, specifically (officially i'm the Book Repair Assistant and Bindery Prep Supervisor). they are responsible for processing and prepping monographs and periodicals to go to the commercial binder. we send a shipment twice a month. it's a pain. in the old days they sent a shipment of 800 items every week! but with so much electronic access for periodicals, we only send about 500 items a month.


the boss's office. this is where we eat and have shop parties. we cook paste in the microwave. yes, the microwave. it works fine. (don't all faint at once)


board sheer.


giant board sheer and chewbacca (the black board sheer on the left. it needs to be oiled. if you lift the blade just slowly enough, it sounds just like Chewbacca.)

thus ends the virtual tour. come fall i will begin coming to work on saturdays where i can have the place and equipment all to myself for my own work. i also can borrow anything i need from the conservation lab across the hall (including finishing tools!!!!). it's a sweet setup i really haven't taken enough advantage of. but don't worry, i'm ready.

from the garden: mid-summer magic

it's amazing what days in a row of 90+ degree weather does for those heat-lovin' veggies.

for instance, two saturdays ago the beans were in blossom. beautiful white and purple blossoms. just one week later there were slender, ripening, six-inch beans already dangling from the bunches of bush beanness.

for another instance, last monday i surveyed the state of the zucchini plant: plenty of blossoms, some moderately sized squash coming along quite nicely. two-and-a-half days later, or possibly three--BOOM! gigantic zucchini of death is born! i turn my back for a second and the plant goes wild! (as a preemptive strike, mom has plucked all squash from the vine, including those that are just barely big enough to eat.) for anyone who has not grown zucchini in the intermountain west, it is a test not only of one's constant diligence in guarding the plant (and your front porch) but also a test of your creativity in preparing a variety of zucchini dishes and desserts that go beyond the limp, steamed option.

peppers have magically appeared on plants that double in size in a week, and--my favorite of all--tiny purple jewel-like eggplants are peeking out from beneath the hoods of their shriveled purple blooms.

all of these mid-summer, heat-loving little buddies were planted memorial day weekend--nearly 50 days ago. (take a look a few blog entries back to remember their puny, tidiness) here is what a gorgeous, wet June and a perfectly hot July have wrought:

tomatoes and basil. one more month and the tomatoes will be ready to eat.

remains of the spring garden: lettuce row partially demolished and kale

baby jalapenos!

beans. yeah, so the rows are a little tight...

one-week old beans!

baby eggplant. my fave. no one is excited about this entity in the garden.
just wait until crystals eggplant curry...

octopus of a zucchini plant. find the squash, and you win!

the sweetest cukes in all the world. they're supposed to grow on a trellis. ah, well.

rhubarb chard. the leaves have suffered a bit, but still. brilliant. i swear i heard this thing whisper, "feed me, seymour!" as i walked by.

my least favorite squash looking the most gorgeous on a sunday afternoon.

since May we've been enjoying loads of delicious garden lettuce of three varieties in salad after salad....



and so far we've employed zucchini in zucchini chocolate chip cookies and as a simple side sauteed in butter and canola oil with fresh ground pepper, salt, a little seasoning, and freshly grated Parmesan cheese.


coming up next: the once-a-year gooseberry pie, black currant jelly, and pesto-o-rama brought to you by the magnificent 9 basil plants.

from the bindery: binding books with God

It’s possible God is a Bookbinder.

Which I conclude because I have found that everything about the process of learning to bind books has everything to do with the pursuit of truth and faith.

Here’s the beef.

So, at the North Bennet Street School, where I attended the 2-year bookbinding program (not “boobbinding,” as I’m fond of typo-ing), the tasks and skills to master were daunting. I remember the first day of school when our instructor took time to go over the whole 2-year syllabus: non-adhesive bindings, flatbacks, case bindings, onset boards, split boards, half-leather cases, clamshell boxes, rebacks, plaquettes, fine binding, research projects, etc. etc. Not surprisingly, it left me reeling with anxiety, self-doubt, and dwindling self-confidence.

(here are a few examples of curriculum bindings)

(non-adhesive coptic binding, 9.06)

(rounded and backed case binding, 9-10.06)

(half-leather case binding, 5.07)

(model of 9th century Carolingian binding bound in oak boards and full calf, 11.07--i think)

(full leather design binding model, 4.08)

Even so, it was critical to see the end goals we were working towards. Whenever we took on a new project at school, our instructor followed a similar pattern by beginning the discussion and demo by showing a completed model of the book and explaining its place in the curriculum and in the context of book structures and history. This provided important visual reference and context.

Despite the initial deluge of information and newness, the minute we got to work and focused on one thing at a time, the minute I began to feel that all was possible. We began with simple projects and skills and built on them, with each new project building upon the last, teaching something a little more complicated.

(Us getting to work!)

(Yumiko working on a repair)

(Tim marbling paper)

(Wendy sanding a board)

(Monica paring leather with a spokeshave)

(Elizabeth lining the spine of her book)

Early on, with so little experience, it was difficult to see the full importance of performing and perfecting a tiny skill. It was easy to feel discouraged when you kept drilling that hole in the wrong spot, or kept forgetting to trim your turn-ins, or dinged the recently polished edge of your French paring knife, or could only lift the cloth from the board clumsily and with painstaking slowness. Nevertheless, we kept working.

With so little experience in the beginning, I had to take my instructor’s word for it. Sometimes I’d fudge and forget something important. Only as i worked on more books and learned increasingly complex skills and structures did I begin developing enough hindsight to see how the processes that occur early on affect the binding. For instance, if one doesn’t tighten the thread consistently while sewing a textblock, the entire stability of the book may be compromised, but you can’t really see until the book is finished or when looking over an older damaged book with failed sewing. Some of the littlest things—something as little as tugging a bit on a length of linen thread, or tying a knot correctly, or applying one more paper lining—could make or break a binding. Literally.


Furthermore—and most importantly—I began to see the order of the curriculum and how certain skills were necessary to develop before it was even possible to attempt something more advanced. It you weren't proficient in handling a scalpel and straight edge, or able to distinguish grain in board, paper or cloth, or unfamiliar with the properties of the various adhesives, there was no way you would have the capacity or ability to move on to the greater complexities of leather binding or repair work. Those are very simple, basic examples, but they make the point.

As the months passed I began to see my experience at school as this phenomenal, incredibly tangible process of learning. Over the course of months I could hold my learning and progress in my hands in the form of model size books. I could hold two books—one made in September and one in December—side-by-side, and look at what I had learned. I had proof that I was learning and gaining perspective and knowledge. Even thinking of this right now it amazes me. It is a jewel of vision that I can analogize to every aspect of learning in my life right now. After so many repetitions I could actually see what our instructor had meant in direction he’d given. My fingers began to know and my eyes began to see.

I had clarity.

(here i am at school, covering my first full leather binding...with little clarity.)

But in the midst of that bit of clarity, I continued to uncover many, many more questions. And thus the cycle continues.


To learn anything, you begin with many unknowns and unfamiliarities. We always start small and simple (literally small, even, as babies.) and build bit by bit. But if you are Christina Q. Thomas, you especially want to grasp and master a task or an idea all at once. And if you don’t, you pout in frustration for a bit. This bit-by-bit concept means nothing to your impatience and impetuosity.

Until you became a bookbinder.

Bookbinding school and my continuing work has increased my comfort level with unknowns and granted me insight into this bit-by-bit learning process and the tremendous role my own creativity and willingness to delve into trial-and-error play in the process. I am learning even now the importance of taking a basic principle or rule in the trade and experimenting with it, seeing how it works for myself. Also, and Miraculously! I have become a little more patient and a little less impetuous (which is probably another huge reason why i half steered myself and was half steered into this profession).

~

So what does this have to do with God?

It’s like this.

So, I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Some of my beliefs describe with quite a bit of order and clarity the reasons for life and being here on this Earth. The big picture. The syllabus at the beginning of a course, if you will. The big picture I fit into—and that everyone on this Earth fits into—is the simple storyline of the Plan of Salvation, or Plan of Happiness.

Knowing the big picture, however, we are left still with real life lived at a more micro kind of level. Just as at school, in life I progress bit by bit (or bid by bid...), experience by experience, developing a certain skill and then another built upon that.

When contemplating all that is required to build oneself into a truly Christlike person, it is easy to feel those same feelings I felt at the beginning of school. My weaknesses seem expansive and insurmountable. It is difficult to see progress. And on top of that, amidst the light, there is darkness and uncertainty. The gospel I live by is to me at once incredibly simple, straightforward and complex and nuanced. For all its answers, there are just as many if not more unknowns—unknowns that for some barely cause ripples in the water, and for others wreak havoc. I, for one, do not always see the importance of obedience to certain principles; I do not always know how to respond to an institutional religion; I at times long for answers to many questions revolving around the Church’s history and future.

Just as at school, there is at once anxiety and peace in the big picture. I look at it, I get a sense of direction—a goal—and I get to work.

starting small.

working steadily.

building to greater things

…….AND greater understanding and wisdom.

Understanding and clarity that come only with time, experience, faith, and hard work.


I get it.

I have felt the range of emotions towards the unknowns and the unanswerables: discouragement, frustration, anger, disillusionment, as well as delight, curiosity, and total peace in faith. For me now, the unknowns build patience in process, patience in the design of God’s teaching method—which method is, at least according to my experience, that understanding, clarity, and light come as the necessary “skills” are acquired.

Does this make sense? Have I said the same thing repeatedly in enough different ways that you know what I mean? Will you believe me now that God might just possibly be a bookbinder? Well, we know judging by this Earth, that He is a remarkably skilled craftsman of all sorts.

As usual, God sums all this up much more concisely than I in scripture. In The Book of Mormon, in 2 Nephi, Chapter 28, verse 30, God gently reminds us:

“For behold….I will give unto the children of men line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little; and blessed are those who hearken unto my precepts, and lend an ear unto my counsel, for they shall learn wisdom; for unto him that receiveth I will give more; and from them that shall say, We have enough, from them shall be taken away even that which they have.”

Becoming a bookbinder has magnified this principle in my life, and I cling to it fiercely.

I trust God more despite doubts and times of cognitive dissonance. I understand what line upon line, precept upon precept means. I don’t see God as someone keeping us in the dark just because he can. We seem to be in the dark, because that is how learning is and that is what we chose. Because we are responsible for searching and seeking, not merely being shown. Just as at school as we were shown and then told to go and do, so it is with God. This process is the point, and perhaps it is the most important point I will ever learn as a bookbinder and a child of God.