Nag Hammadi Bookbinding

Leather books were found in the Upper Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi in 1945 with Coptic writing from the 4th Century, one containing the Gospel of St. Thomas; housed in the Coptic Museum in Cairo.

From The Archaeology of Medieval Bookbinding by J.A. Szirmai

In a Nag Hammadi Bookbinding workshop I learned how to make the book from Jana Pullman at the Focus on Book Arts in Oregon. We created a replica using tooling techniques on the leather cover. Jana referenced this book: The Archaeology of Medieval Bookbinding by J.A. Szirmai.

I cut the outline from a piece of leather, and wet it to emboss the design with a butterfly leather stamp from Tandy Leather. 

I used my Japanese Book Drill for the turquoise mat board to show through the design.

In the class we glued several papyrus sheets to make the cover boards. At home mat board worked - covered with bookcloth - adhered to the back of the leather.

The outer side glued first, then the top and bottom tabs. I was going to cover them with end sheet fabric - decided to leave it open. 

 

Next I used my new sewing cradle bought from Missy Bosch last week. I love it! 



Missy sells them on Etsy here:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/267511021/bookbinding-sewing-cradle-collapsible?ref=shop_home_active_1

Lastly, I hole punched and sewed the tie plus sewed the text block to the spine with tacket binding making the text block refillable. I am pleased with how it came out too! 

Making the Nag Hammadi did not take me as long as I thought it would. The most time-consuming part was embossing the wet leather. I made additional books with red leather and blue leather covers - for sale on my Etsy site: www.ARTbooks.Etsy.com

Please let me know if you tried any type of historic bookbinding. Makes me feel connected to the 4th century!

The Workshop Experience

Not too far from my home I have book-binding and calligraphy workshops. Houston is the 4th largest city in the US, with many workshops each year or semester-long classes too. 

My thoughts on how to enjoy excellent art or craft workshops:

---Teacher attributes:

• Handout with good instructions for what we are doing.
• Thoroughly qualified - can respond intelligently to questions.
• Shares about their background, perhaps with photos.
• Provides samples of past work & samples of what we are doing.
• Gives individual attention besides the group discussion.

---Group conditions:

• Minimal amount of supplies needed; I’d rather have a supply fee than lug supplies.
• Ease of participants talking quietly, but not too noisy either.

---Space:

• Enough private area in front of each student.
• A comfortable seat (I also bring a pillow).
• Not too cold and not too hot inside (I dress in layers).

Wonderful book-binding workshops are taught at The Printing Museum, either paid classes or at meetings of the Houston Book Arts Guild which meets there too.

About 3 or 4 calligraphy workshops each year are sponsored by The Houston Calligraphy Guild; we have teachers from Belgium to California coming in to teach.

Please let me know your thoughts about workshops; what works for you?

©Anne Rita Taylor 2016

My Bookbinding Workshop

©Anne Rita Taylor 2016

I went to a Golden Paint demo at Art Supply on Main in Houston earlier this year. When Vikki, the co-owner, found out about my blog, she asked me to teach a book workshop; during May we set a date for the workshop: Saturday, July 16th.

My favorite binding is the French Link Stitch. I made a sample book, composed my own instructions, took a few photos and sent the draft flyer to a couple of friends for their advice. 

E.J. said cost stand alone from supply fee; the total was listed. Debbie gave me paper from India; no charge to my students. I added paper choices to my flyer.

I handed out 30 flyers at the Houston Calligraphy Guild Summer Study meeting. Also sent my flyer to The Lone Star Art Guild added to their weekly emailed newsletter.

Four people registered by the Wednesday before the workshop! I started tearing a few sheets of my Arches Text Wove for my demonstration book, as I wanted to use three sheets divided into eight pieces. Vikki let me know she was out of Arches but had Rives.

Five were registered by Thursday! I used up my own supply of Arches Text Wove, and Vikki supplied Rives BFK Lightweight. Multi-Media art paper suitable for wet media from Hobby Lobby rounded out the text paper. It took ink and watercolor beautifully.

Before the class I cut: paper for the covers, end sheets, inside paper folios showing at the spine; plus I tore the Arches and cut the Multi-Media paper.

The students used eight pieces of each of the three types of paper. And divided them into three folios in eight signatures to have a total of 96 pages (both sides). The students tore two half sheets of the Rives Lightweight into quarters to get into the bookbinding groove.

In the class: we covered the boards and hole-punched the signatures in the morning; sewed the text block in the afternoon. Lastly, we glued the end sheets to add the covers and glued the tapes to the cover.

The five hour class on Saturday went very well especially since four out of five students were first-time bookbinders. Everyone loved their books! It was a lot of fun!

Bookbinding in Los Angeles

©Anne Rita Taylor 2016

I like to take a class when I travel. I found Charlene Matthews Bindery in Hollywood when I visited Los Angeles during Halloween 2010. We emailed to come up with a day when she had a workshop. Turned out I was the only student!

Charlene’s bindery is a storefront on Melrose Avenue where you can see the famous Hollywood sign. Charlene has bound books for movies such as Indiana Jones. We had a whole day - including lunch - of bookbinding. I was in heaven! 

Charlene showed me around her fabulous shop and asked me what I’d like to learn. Even though I was bookbinding for a while I look for alternatives to use. Charlene let me know she was using something new: a fine mesh screen-like material for pages and covers. 

Charlene demonstrated, covering the fine mesh with paper; we each made covers. We made the spine pieces, figuring out which paper to wrap around them; we hole-punched the signatures using lovely watercolor paper, and sewed the text block through the mesh onto the spine.

Since I made two spine pieces Charlene suggested I make another book with a leather wrap-around cover. I learned that the thread does not need to go through every station (hole) that was punched. It was a revelation to me!

I love these variations of the Tightback Longstitch Bindings taught by Charlene. I had not used spine pieces before and the books open flat for art journaling.

Charlene sent me home with some of that fine mesh material which I’ve since found at Ace Hardware. Recently I bought a whole roll of it and I'll use it too.