Antiquarian Bookbinding

Antiquarian Bookbinding

                                                       Click on images to enlarge

The last of the Elizabethan Geneva Bibles 1603, bound in the
style of the Royal Binder to Queen Elizabeth I. By Paul Tronson

Antiquarian Bookbinding and Ancient Book Arts

Bookbinding by Paul Tronson
A'Cambridge'panelled calf binding
Using 3 vegetable dyes.

People ask "Why do you do antiquarian book restoration
when nowadays people are more likely to sit at a computer
than read a book?"

In 'When Things Start To Think.' by Neil Gersenfield, he makes the point that 'If the book had been invented after the laptop, it would be seen as a very clever invention'.

It is considered 'retro' to say that 'You don't like computers and would rather read a book.' and there are very polarised debates between people arguing for digital books and people arguing for printed books who consider the digital book advocates illiterate heathens who don't know the value of learning, reading and writing.

Books are remarkable, you can open a book instantly, you can rapidly flip the pages, you can drop it and it continues working. (Although, please don't drop this one.) It doesn't need any maintenance except once every hundred years or so and you can view it from any angle and almost any light. As Professor Gerhsenfeld, says 'The one thing a laptop can do is change so that leads to the question of how do we bring that to the book?'

Antiquarian Bookbinding and Modern Book Arts

My dream is to make the Ancient Book Arts as pleasing to the modern eye as possible but to allow
traditional bookbinding to be
seen as it truly is.......... an art form
by drawing on the styles, skills and techniques of great Master Bookbinders
Period Fine Bindings can
recreate the sumptiousness and inspired antiquarian bookbinding of the ages.

Bookbinding by Paul Tronson
( Fermented black plums, red cherries and cochineale are the natural dyes used in this binding )

Paul Tronson Master Bookbinder

Email:periodfinebindings@googlemail.com

Next Page  Book binding & The "Cambridge" Panelled Calf

 

Compare some of the following fine bindings with modern day Book Arts presented by Richard Minsky

28 Bookbinding/Book of hours (Northern Netherlands, 1497)
33 Bookbinding by Christopher Plantin (Antwerp, 1550) 
48 Textile bookbinding (The Netherlands, 1615-1620) 
58 Bookbinding (Amsterdam, Kircher-binder, 1671) 
64 Bookbinding by the First Stadholders' Bindery (Middelburg, 1734-1738?) 
66 Bookbinding by Suenonius Mandelgreen (Middelburg, 1757) 
74 Bookbinding by Friedrich W.I.C. Kolb (Amsterdam, 1835)
82 Bookbinding by Dirk Nicolaas Esveld (Amsterdam, 1912)
85 C.S. Adama van Scheltema: De tors (Rotterdam, 1924) 

The Koninklijke Bibliotheek is a treasure-house of antiquarian bookbinding, books and manuscripts from many centuries.