T H E W O R K S O F W I L L I A M S H A K E S P E A R E

‘The Works of William Shakespeare’, 37 plays, 1850. This book had split in two and the spine was disintegrating. The book was put back together by using the ‘Interlocking hinge’ method, a more economical way of repair - rather then re-sewing the whole text block. A new spine was then made for the book, which we call a leather re-back.

'Tale of a Tub'

'A Tale of a Tub: written for the universal improvement of mankind.' John Nutt, 1704, 2nd edition. The front board to this edition was completely detached from the text block; therefore I used a tacking method to re-attach it back together. This involves sewing through the first few signatures, the board itself and the spine very carefully. The repairs are then concealed with conservation grade Japanese tissue and colored to match the original color of the book.

'Voyages du chevalier Chardin en Perse, et autres lieux de l'Orient'

'Voyages du chevalier Chardin en Perse, et autres lieux de l'Orient' by John Chardin, London: Moses Pitt, 1686. The front and back of this book were starting to split around the hinge area; therefore the book needed reinforcement on the inner and outer hinges. The leather was lifted away on the exterior of the book and a thin Japanese tissue was inserted under the leather to give this area strength. A layer of Japanese tissue was also placed over this to conceal the repair and then colored with acrylics to match the pigment of the leather. All four corners of the book were heavily damaged and curling, and to rectify this wheat paste was injected into the corners and left to set. Once dry each corner was repaired with Japanese tissue and again colored to match the color of the leather. Finally, the head and end cap of the spine was disintegrating badly, so pieces of Japanese tissue were molded to build up the new spine. Again this was colored with pigments to match the color of the leather.