The Open Road; A Little Book for Wayfarers

1905

Special Collections PR6023 U24 O6

London: Methuen

During her working career, Eleanor Joachim exhibited her bindings in New Zealand and Melbourne for a variety of arts clubs and societies but her output diminished after the 1920s. The open volume above, a copy of Poems by Mr Gray, shows Joachim’s trademark tooled cipher with her initials and the date of binding. The copy of The Open Road is an excellent example of Joachim’s beautifully executed decorative style. Fully bound in brown morocco, this volume’s front cover design is made up of at least six separate tools, all worked individually by hand. Joachim worked from paper patterns she drew and overlaid onto the leather cover; her workbook housed in the Hocken Library contains many of her extant patterns.