Through the Woods. This print is an example of his design style.]]> Edgar Mansfield]]> ]]> Terence]]> The Lives of Sundry Eminent Persons in this Later Age: In Two Parts…

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Samuel Clark]]>
A Collection of Several Philosophical Writings carries a fine example of a mottled binding. Mottling is the process of decorating the covers of a book by applying colour or acid (dabs of ferrous sulphate, copperas, or lye (soft soap and soda)) to the leather calf and producing a variegated effect. Ornate gilt decoration runs around the edge of the cover and in each compartment down the spine. The edges have been sprinkled, which was a fashion in the 17th century English bookbinding scene. This book was once owned by Sir Thomas Sebright, the 4th or 5th Baronet, whose bookplate bares the motto: Servare Mentem, ‘To preserve equanimity’. Perhaps Sir Thomas commissioned the binding?]]> Henry More]]> A Collection of Several Philosophical Writings carries a fine example of a mottled binding. Mottling is the process of decorating the covers of a book by applying colour or acid (dabs of ferrous sulphate, copperas, or lye (soft soap and soda)) to the leather calf and producing a variegated effect. Ornate gilt decoration runs around the edge of the cover and in each compartment down the spine. The edges have been sprinkled, which was a fashion in the 17th century English bookbinding scene. This book was once owned by Sir Thomas Sebright, the 4th or 5th Baronet, whose bookplate bares the motto: Servare Mentem, ‘To preserve equanimity’. Perhaps Sir Thomas commissioned the binding?]]> Henry More]]> Forget Me Not: a Christmas and New Year’s Present for 1823. This case-bound Confessions of Christendom for Clark of Edinburgh reveals printed advertising reused for the spine backing. The spine title was certainly block printed flat before being attached to the book.]]> Georg Benedikt Winer]]> Forget Me Not: a Christmas and New Year’s Present for 1823. This case-bound Confessions of Christendom for Clark of Edinburgh reveals printed advertising reused for the spine backing. The spine title was certainly block printed flat before being attached to the book.]]> Georg Benedikt Winer]]> Continuation.]]> J. Crull]]> Jeremy Taylor]]> Jeremy Taylor]]> Jeremy Taylor]]> Johann Beckmann]]> ]]> Johann Beckmann]]> ___]]> ___]]> ___]]> ___]]> ___]]> ___]]> ___]]> ___]]> ___]]> Poetical Works of Sir Walter Scott has a stamped centrepiece decoration containing an enamelled image of a vase and flowers. The use of cover designs like this diminished as publishers adopted the cheaper plain cloth covered boards and relied more heavily on the eye-catching components of the book jacket. Ward and Lock began publishing in 1854, and they developed a strong poetry line, reprinting old favourites such as William Cowper in uniform, easily recognisable, gilt-edged, colourful case-bound bindings. These two elaborate publisher’s bindings sit beside a Yellowback, the nickname for cheap, commercial paperbacks published by firms such as Routledge and Ward and Lock, and sold through W. H. Smith’s railway station bookstalls. Created by Edmund Evans about 1849, they featured a basic colour (usually yellow) as the background for the illustration. Yellowbacks also included hardbacks, like Besant’s All Sorts and Conditions of Men (1886).]]> Walter Besant]]> Poetical Works of Sir Walter Scott has a stamped centrepiece decoration containing an enamelled image of a vase and flowers. The use of cover designs like this diminished as publishers adopted the cheaper plain cloth covered boards and relied more heavily on the eye-catching components of the book jacket. Ward and Lock began publishing in 1854, and they developed a strong poetry line, reprinting old favourites such as William Cowper in uniform, easily recognisable, gilt-edged, colourful case-bound bindings. These two elaborate publisher’s bindings sit beside a Yellowback, the nickname for cheap, commercial paperbacks published by firms such as Routledge and Ward and Lock, and sold through W. H. Smith’s railway station bookstalls. Created by Edmund Evans about 1849, they featured a basic colour (usually yellow) as the background for the illustration. Yellowbacks also included hardbacks, like Besant’s All Sorts and Conditions of Men (1886).]]> Walter Besant]]> An Apology for Brotherly Love (1798) certainly looks like it has an inlay, it does not. The binder has coloured the outer calf leather green and then used intersecting double fillets to produce the effect of an inlay binding. The inscription within – ‘T. C. Fell, June 1804 The gift of a very worthy man and his courteous parishioner of Berkswich, Staffordshire’ – gives an indication of when this simple, but attractive binding was produced.]]> Richard Hill]]>