Welcome to About Bookbinding your resource
for FREE bookbinding information.
by Joseph W. Zaehnsdorf
3rd Edition Published in London 1897
been used with very good results. If the pattern to be inlaid be
very small, steel punches of the exact shape of the tools are
used to punch or cut out the patterns required. To do this,
work the pattern in blind on the side of the book; take morocco
of a different colour to the ground it is required to decorate, and
pare it down as thin as possible. Lay it on a slab of lead. Lead
is better than anything else on account of its softness; the
marks made by the punch can always be beaten out again, and
when quite used up it may be re-melted and run out anew.
Now take the steel punch of an exact facsimile of the tool used
that is to be inlaid, and punch out from the leather that required
number. These are to be pasted and laid very carefully on the
exact spot made by the blind-tooling; press each down well into
the leather, either with a folding-stick or the fingers, so that it
adheres properly. When dry, the book should be pressed
between polished plates, in order that the pieces that have
been laid on, may be pressed well into the ground leather.
in the working will hide all the edges of the various inlaid pieces, provided they are laid on exactly.
If interlacing bands are to be of various colours, the bands must be cut out. Pare the leather thin, and after working
the pattern through the paper on to the sides of the book, lay it on the thinly pared leather; with a very sharp and
pointed knife cut through the paper and leather together on a soft board. Or the design may be worked or drawn on
a thin board, and the various bands cut out of the board as patterns. Lay these on the thin leather and cut round
them. Keep these board templates for any future use of the same patterns. The various pieces are to be well
pasted, carefully adjusted in their places, and well rubbed down. The leather is then to be prepared and worked off
in gold.
Another method is to work the pattern in blind on the sides. Pare the morocco thin, and while damp place it upon the
portion of the pattern to be inlaid, and press it well with the fingers, so that the design is impressed into it. Lay the
leather carefully on some soft board, and cut round the lines made visible by the pressure with a very sharp knife.
When cut out, paste and lay them on the book and prepare as before, and finish in gold. I do not recommend this
last method as being of much value; I give it only because it is sometimes chosen; but for any good work, where
accuracy is required, either of the plans mentioned previously are to be preferred.
The Viennese work their calf in quite a different manner, in fact, in the same way that the cabinet-makers inlay their
woodwork. With a very sharp and thin knife they cut right through two leathers laid the one on the other. The
bottom one is then lifted out and replaced by the tope one. By this method the one fits exactly into the other, so
that, if properly done, the junctions are so neatly made that no finishing is required to cover the line where the two
colours meet.
The frontispiece to this treatise is a copy of a book bound by my father for one of the Exhibitions. The ground is of red
morocco, inlaid with green, brown, and black morocco. The pattern may be called “ Renaissance.” The inside of the
boards are “Grolier,” inlaid as elaborately as the outside. Seven months’ labour was expended on the outside
decoration of this volume.
Porous.-Calf, as before described, requires more and different preparation than morocco, on account of its soft and
absorbing nature. As a foundation or gourndwork, paste of different degrees of strength is used, according to the
various work required.
email: info@aboutbookbinding.com
