Bookbinding for Book Historians

Course Description

With greater access to digital surrogates, catalogers, special collections librarians, bibliographers, researchers, and collectors are becoming increasingly interested in the materiality of bound volumes. This course will focus on understanding the working methods and typical binding structures from the seventeenth century through the introduction of case binding in the second quarter of the nineteenth century. Unlike many of the printed texts that they contain, bindings can differ from one physical copy to another based upon several factors, making it important to accurately understand, catalog, and describe them.  

Designed for people with little or no prior bookbinding experience, participants in the course will complete three bookbinding models during the week: a seventeenth/eighteenth-century laced-in leather trade binding, a boarded binding circa 1800, and a case binding from about 1840. This is primarily a hands-on learning experience, but bench time will be supplemented by studying surviving historical examples along with PowerPoint lectures showing variations in binding traditions from several countries. The goal of the class is not to create “perfect” bindings but rather to facilitate a deeper understanding of book structure and to better enable participants to decipher clues to structural elements often hidden beneath the surface of surviving contemporary bindings.  

Please note: This course will be held in Boston, MA at the North Bennet Street School in facilities used to teach a two-year, comprehensive bookbinding program. While the course will focus extensively on structural elements of bookbinding, decoration will be discussed only as time allows. 

Faculty

Jeff Altepeter

Jeff Altepeter is the Bookbinding Department Head at North Bennet Street School in Boston.

Todd Pattison

Todd Pattison is the Conservator for American Ancestors. Previously, he worked as a book conservator at the Northeast Document Conservation Center for more than 25 years and was the Collections …

Advance Reading List

Primary Readings

Abbott, Jacob. The Harper Establishment; or, The Story of the Story Books. NY: Harper, 1855. Pages 130–155. https://arch nive.org/details/harperestablishm00abbo/page/n5/mode/2up

Hill, Jonathan E. “From Provisional to Permanent: Books in Boards, 1790-1840.” The Library: Transactions of the Bibliographic Society 21, no. 3, Sept. 1999: 247–273.

Pickwoad, Nicholas. “Onward and Downward: How Binders Coped with the Printing Press before 1800.” In A Millennium of the Book: Production, Design, and Illustration in Manuscript and Print, 900–1900, edited by Robin Myers and Michael Harris. New Castle, DE: Oak Knoll Press, 1994: 61–106.

Suggested Readings

Bainbridge, Abigail. “Bookbinding According to Diderot: An Exploration of Eighteenth-Century French Binding.” Journal of Paper Conservation, 16 (2): 67–73.

Embree, Anna. “Best Practices for Historic Model Work.” In Suave Mechanicals: Essays on the History of Bookbinding. Vol. 9. Ed. Julia Miller. Ann Arbor, MI: The Legacy Press, 2025: 480–498.

Middleton, Bernard. A History of English Craft Bookbinding Technique. Fourth Edition. New Castle and London: Oak Knoll Press & The British Library, 2008: 1–164.

Course History