#fine binding

[thesixthduke]

For the love of books

[uchicagoscrc]

Ellen Gates Starr (1859-1940) is perhaps best remembered for co-founding Hull House with Jane Addams in 1889. After establishing a Chicago chapter of Arts and Crafts Society in 1897, Starr traveled to England to study bookbinding with T. J. Cobden-Sanderson of Doves Bindery. Upon returning to Chicago, she started a bookbinding class at Hull House and accepted commissions. The University of Chicago holds a number of her bookbindings in its Rare Books Collection.

[sosnastudios]

finished Vita Nuova art nouveau-style fine binding!

peacock blue goatskin with crimson goatskin gold tooled-edge letters, gold tooled swirling lines, duck eggshell panel silhouette, crimson leather headbands, and hand-marbled paper (made by me)

(photos by Jenn Pellecchia)

[futurebird]

Engravings from a victorian picturebook.

The living world: a complete natural history of the world's creatures by J.W. Buel was first published in 1891-- this book looks like an absolute delight, the kind of book one could get lost in for hours.

It seems harder to find such books being published today. I think in someways a book like this could fill the role that surfing the web and watching videos do today.

I especially love these creatures of the deep. The crowded cluttered image of abundance reminds me of Victorian style museums where everything is just shoved together to impress with abundance and variety.

[thistle-and-bee-press]

Some lovely Victorian-ish Era fashion, in a beautiful album from a relative.

I'm fascinated by the little sleeve ruffle in the third picture.

[noelcollection]

Happy Birthday (or rather, day of christening) to Scottish philosopher and economist Adam Smith (1723-1790), author of The Wealth of Nations! 

Adam Smith poured over a decade of research into his classic work that laid the foundation for the discipline of modern economics. The Wealth of Nations (1776) introduced the concept of absolute advantage and challenged mercantilism (wealth comes from maximizing exports and minimizing imports) and physiocracy (wealth comes from physical land) by arguing that wealth may be built through free-market capitalism. Smith’s magnum opus shaped the terms of debate for both his proponents and critics for centuries after its publication. The Wealth of Nations comes in second place for the most-cited pre-1950 economic texts (behind Karl Marx’s Das Kapital). And even the leading modern social science publication Das Kapital : Kritik der politischen Öekonomie (1867), is largely Marx’s answer to Smith’s Wealth of Nations. 

Much to printer William Strahan’s pleasant surprise, the first edition of The Wealth of Nations sold out in six months. He didn’t expect a work that “requires much thought and reflection” to be so popular. Based on the bookplate, our first edition copy was likely snagged by a member of the Treffry family that hails from Cornwall, England. 

If nothing else, we hope you enjoy the vibrant morocco labels (see photo at the top) and the spotted polished calf that embellish an otherwise dense (even by late eighteenth-century standards) tome of economic theory. 

Link to catalog record: https://bit.ly/3tEVNGR

[theofficialbibliodotcom]

The Wind in the Willows

Listed by Peter Harrington: This lovely copy of The Wind in the Willows was printed by The Limited Editions Club in 1940 as a limited edition of 2,020 copies of which this is number 1,991 signed by the designer Bruce Rogers. Rackham illustrated the 1940 Limited Editions Club edition which ended up being the last book he illustrated before his death in 1939; it is from this edition that the present was reprinted.

Finely bound by the Chelsea Bindery in dark green morocco, spine lettered and decorated in gilt, raised bands, single rule to boards gilt, pictorial onlay of Badger, Rat and Mole on front cover, inner dentelles gilt, floral endpapers, top edge gilt, others untrimmed. With 16 colour illustrations by the artist.  See the full listing on Biblio

[zhalfirin]