http://www.articletrader.com/ Articles at ArticleTrader en-us http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/bookbinding-how-to-traditionally-bind-a-book_1.html http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/bookbinding-how-to-traditionally-bind-a-book_1.html Tue, 30 Jun 2009 16:27:56 -0500
Stage 1. The start point of traditional book binding is to gather the sections of pages (chapters) of the book together with the guards, otherwise known as protection pages. These are then sewn together.

Stage 2. This phase is called rounding and backing, this is the process where the book is clamped in a traditional Laying Press and by using a Backing Hammer the sections are coaxed around to first of all create a concave front edge (a round) and then to create a shoulder for the cover boards to sit in (or for a French groove). The spine of the book is then lined using a material called Mull. This is for added strength for the sewn pages and also the mull will go around to the inside of the cover boards when the endpapers are eventually glued down. After the mull the spine is lined using Manilla or Kraft paper (this can be two or three layers thick, each time with a layer of glue PVA in between). In order to take the strain off the spine when the book is laid flat, we create a hollow. This is done by either using the lining of the spine in a specific manner so that the thinly pared leather can be slipped down the sides of it when creating the headbands, or we can use a totally separate piece of card inside the spine and glued directly to the leather (a cased in style book).

Stage 3. The boards are hand cut to a precise size to overlap the pages of the book, these are then attached by tapes which are cut into the actual boards themselves (the tapes are part of the initial sewing procedure but become an integral part of the binding). The boards are then lined over the tapes, which attach to the spine. Each board is then sanded to ensure the boards are smooth. Depending on the covering the skin of the book is then cut, this can be anything from Goats skin, leather, buckram or a synthetic. The preparation known as paring using a sharfix paring machine is then undertaken with the skin, this basically is the thinning of the skin around the spine of the book, the head caps (top and tail of the spine where the leather will be folded over and moulded into head caps) and also the edges are thinned a lot, so when the leather is placed and moulded around the edges of the board it is of uniform thickness and goes around nice and evenly. The edge paring is then finished off by hand with a knife. The spine is then enhanced with raised bands by moulding leather around the bands. Head caps are at the top and bottom of the spine. Often they are moulded around the headbands using a bone folder (a whale bone tool) Leather corners are added to a half leather binding. If a full leather binding is in order then this speaks for itself. The excess leather or skin used is then trimmed if need to accommodate the cloth sides when binding in a half leather style.

Stage 4. The embossed design or cresting of a book is then done using a JT Marshall hot blocker. This basically consists of a hot plate with a temperature gauge and thermostat. Out block has been converted from gas to electric. We use zinc embossing dies which are made for us by A J Engravers in Kent. These dies can be made from any outline image. The Titling is done by hand using traditional hand letters, heated on a finishing stove and gold leaf is used for the lettering and embossing. Gold banding is applied to the raised bands by hand using traditional hand tools and pallets and gauges.

Stage 5. The book must sit in a press for many hours after the covering is complete. After which the end papers can be glued down. Once this is done, the book must, again, be placed in a book press or nipping press for many hours, days, even weeks.

Traditional bookbinding is still undertaken at chesterbookbinders.co.uk


--
John Harvey is an avid book collector who runs a book auction site at bid4abook.co.uk he found that traditional bookbinding is still undertaken at chesterbookbinders.co.uk in Chester in Buckley.

Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/book-collecting.html http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/book-collecting.html Wed, 27 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0600
My start point was in 2000, when one of my brothers came to visit, I had two bags of what I classed as junk ready to go to the charity shops. My brother who was making a living from selling antiques via ebay, and specialist markets, told me I was wasting money as a lot of the items destined for the charity shop would sell on ebay. Although I was aware of ebay and had looked at the site several years earlier I had not actually sold anything on it. A few weeks later having the time and the motivation I decided to take my brothers advice, I duly photographed and listed the junk on ebay and hey presto, ten days later, most of the items had sold and I was £150.00 the richer. I rather liked the fact of being able to make money from what I perceived as items not worth keeping. So the natural progression was to find more items to sell at little expense. The next couple of months saw me scouring the car boot sales and charity shops for those bargains to make a quick profit from. However, I soon became fed up with the vast array of bric'a'brac lying around the house and the constant packaging challenges, trips to the post office, etc. I had a stop and pause about what I was trying to achieve. It was at this juncture that I met a colleague from work who had been buying and selling old books, Capt WE Johns "Biggles" to be precise! He explained the basics of spotting first editions and post this discussion I decided it was not good being a jack of all trades and master of none. Why books, well I have always loved reading and unbeknown to me my Grandfather was an avid collector, so I guess it was not only an obvious choice but in my genes as well. Having made the decision to restrict myself to books I started to investigate the terms book collecting, rare books, antique books and modern first editions. The expertise to be able to recognize a first edition took me one afternoon several cups of coffee and sore eyes from reading at the computer, yes it was that easy. The web is fantastic in this respect, there are hundreds of articles out there that instantly teach you the art of recognizing first editions, which then enables you to spot rare and antique books as well. I guess what I am saying is that it becomes a natural progression, once you have the basics. So I hit the charity shops, car boot sales and small book dealers to see what was out there. The experiment was to see how much money I could make over a six month period just selling books via ebay. The turn over was very healthy, however, the fees charged by ebay and paypal really ate into the profit, which really got my goat! I continued to sell books through ebay for another three years or so, when out of frustration with the fees I decided to go it alone so to speak!

I believed I could make more money if I could sell my books direct, missing out the middle man called ebay, so I taught myself web design and purchased an auction software package and in Sep 2005 I launched the site bid4abook.co.uk. It has not been plain sailing and yes I made more mistakes than correct ones, but I now have a site that pays for itself through advertising and allows me and anyone else out there to sell used books for free. I have written several articles on the topic of book collecting which are listed within my site and will teach anyone out there who would like to learn how to sell used books for profit. I will finish by saying if you want to be a millionaire then book collecting is probably not the way to go, but if you want a fun hobby that can also make you money then it is worth trying out.

--
John Harvey has been an avid collector of rare and antique books for several years. In 2005 he started up his own antique and rare book auction site bid4abook.co.uk. The site is free for buyers and sellers of books. In addition he runs a book search service at buythebook.eu.

Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/entertainment/photography/photographing-rare-books-for-auction.html http://www.articletrader.com/entertainment/photography/photographing-rare-books-for-auction.html Tue, 22 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0600
This has never been truer than in todays arena of online selling. Unlike the 'bricks and mortar' real world, potential online customers do not have the luxury of physically inspecting their prospective purchase(s), so must rely solely upon the description that you provide and more importantly on the photographs that you have taken of your sale item. If you have ever been on some auction sites, for instance Ebay, you may have noticed that two similar items often sell for vastly differing amounts. Yes, some of this may be down to the sellers feedback points, the quantity of that particular item that is available at that time or a multitude of other reasons, but I would wager that on the vast majority of occasions it is down to the description, but equally important, if not more so, it is due to the way the item has been photographed.For example, you have two identical items for sale, both described in exactly the same fashion, each accompanied by photographs, which is where the similarities end. One has several;first rate, clear, focused and well lit photographs, whilst the other has some blurry, flash obscured photos. Which item would you be more inclined to bid on?

You only have to trawl the numerous auctions on ebay to find some truly woe full pictures that people try to sell their items with. As a seller it can be confusing and discouraging to find that your item;has sold for considerably less than a fellow seller of the same;item or as a reflection of its true sale potential. Is it down to blind luck, market timing or feedback points that the other seller is achieving a higher sale on his book? The answer is that there is only one consistent and prevailing factor An exceptional photograph. Most photographs that appear on auction sites are seriously lacking.It is a never ending source of amazement how some sellers believe they will achieve good sales by posting seriously flawed photographs of their items. In the vast majority of cases the flaws may be singular or a combination or flaws, such as camera flash obscuring part of the book, blurred or out of focus images, poor lighting, washed out or over exposed images, angles used that distort the images or lack luster colors that makes the item appear flat. Even stock photographs used by sellers are often ineffective. For me, one of the worst offenders are those featuring the sellers sausage fingers holding pages open and on more than one occasion I have seen photographs taken from a standing position with the photographers 'Shrek' like bare feet in the frame. Rather than looking at the book you spend you time with your eyes drawn to the state of the unkempt feet protruding into the picture frame like a particularly bad car crash!

What you as the seller ideally want to achieve is a picture that leaps out at you and conveys to the buyer the condition and value of the book and also to highlight any unique selling points. Effective book photography is not difficult and improving your skills with a camera does not have to take long. To view this article with step by step images visit bid4abook.co.uk

--
John Harvey has been an avid collector of rare and antique books for several years. In 2005 he started up his own antique and rare book auction site bid4abook.co.uk. The site is free for buyers and sellers of books.

Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/rare-books-at-auction.html http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/rare-books-at-auction.html Mon, 09 Jul 2007 00:00:00 -0500
I was with a work colleague who started talking about hobbies, he informed me of his passion for rare and antique books. During the discussion he told me how easy it was to spot first editions and that if you were fairly savvy you could actually make decent money from buying old books at charity shops, car boot sales, garage sales and jumble sales. Admittedly being an avid reader and wishing to earn extra money, putting the two together seemed like an ideal pastime. I was fascinated and wanted to know more, he took me to a local second hand bookstore, then on a web tour of the major book sites just to show the money being asked for some of the rarer first editions. I was taken aback by the difference in price from the second hand bookstores to the cheapest available on the web; I realized (as all collectors know) that a profit can be made relatively easily and quickly, given the right selling medium. So it would seem a protégé was in the making. Over the next few weeks I spent my time scouring the web and visiting charity shops in the local area. To my surprise and his, one of the first finds was a true first edition first impression by Mario Puzo for which I paid the princely sum of one pound (Yes £1.00) for. I listed the book on a niche auction site for rare and antique books and ten days later the book sold making a whopping seven hundred and fifty three pounds (Yes £753.00) profit. Needless to say I am now a convert to being a rare book auctioneer in my spare time.

Try it yourself, read the various articles out there on how to identify first edition books, go to your local charity shops and car boot sales and see what you can find. You never know what you will come across, or, how much you could sell it for at bid4abook.co.uk

--
John Harvey has been an avid collector of rare and antique books for several years. In 2005 he started up his own antique and rare book auction site bid4abook.co.uk. The site is free for buyers and sellers of books.

Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/origins-of-rare-books-and-their-value.html http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/origins-of-rare-books-and-their-value.html Mon, 02 Jul 2007 00:00:00 -0500 For further reading on book collecting and the buying and selling of rare and antique books visit: bid4abook.co.uk

--
John Harvey has been an avid collector of rare and antique books for several years. In 2005 he started up his own antique and rare book auction site bid4abook.co.uk. The site is free for buyers and sellers of books.

Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/modern-first-edition-books.html http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/modern-first-edition-books.html Tue, 19 Jun 2007 00:00:00 -0500
It should be borne in mind that the modern day book collector is mainly interested in the First Edition and First Printing/impression (referred to as the first/first) of a title because it is the very first printing and state that the book becomes available in. It is more difficult to obtain as time goes by (many popular first editions were published in small quantities because the author was unknown and only became popular post publishing of their respective book). This is especially true when there are many more reprints/editions of the book in publication/circulation during the following years.

It should be noted that Hardback books are more sought after and are considerably more valuable than paperback books.

There are several methods you can use to determine the edition of a book, but we will concentrate on the modern first edition, the usual methods of identification are:

Firstly, and most common - publishers usually use a numeric system for identifying the Edition of the book. On the Copyright and title pages, you will usually find a string of numbers (1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10) which indicate the edition number. For instance, if the numbers from 1 to 10 are shown, you have a First Edition First Impression (1 represents the First, 2 represents the second, 3 represents the third and so on). A first edition second impression would show 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 (the number 1 has gone). Some publishers show the numbers in a different form (such as 10987654321 or even 13579108642) or use letters (such as abcdefghi).

Some publishers simply state that it is a 'First Edition', or 'First Impression', or 'First Printing', and do not include the edition numbers as above Normally referred to a 'Stated First Edition'.

Some publishers simply state 'First Published' followed by the year (e.g. 'First Published 1990'), and if there are no further printings indicated with subsequent dates, then you may well have the first edition.

A case example of why it is worth collecting the modern day first edition. Do you think the unsuspecting member of the public who bought 'Harry Potter and The philosphers Stone' by JK Rowling for a mere £15.00 when it was first published would realise that within five years it would have a commercial value to any collector of around £15,000.00 (Yes, fifteen thousand pounds). I think not! To those who did and have just read this article, lucky you!

For further reading on collecting rare and antique books visit:bid4abook.co.uk

--
John Harvey has been an avid collector of rare and antique books for several years. In 2005 he started up his own antique and rare book auction site wwwbid4abook.co.uk. The site is free for buyers and sellers of books.

Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]> http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/how-to-store-rare-and-antique-books.html http://www.articletrader.com/home-and-family/hobbies/how-to-store-rare-and-antique-books.html Tue, 12 Jun 2007 00:00:00 -0500
Shelving The appointment of the shelving within a room is important, in an
ideal world it should be a minimum of 3cm away from any given wall to allow the circulation of air. The wall should not be an outside wall as this can encourage damp. The shelving should be robust and not sag in the middle when fully laden. The shelving would ideally be adjustable so books can be stored upright and central to the shelve, again to promote air circulation. Solid book ends should be used to keep the books upright and tightly stacked, not too tight as this can cause damage when gaining access. Large and heavy books can be stored flat but not stacked on top of each other as this can damage the spines.

Humidity and Temperature Dampness within books encourages mould, however, too dry and the paper can become brittle. The ideal temperature would be between 60-70°F.

Light Direct sunlight is the biggest single contributor to book damage (second only to water). Paper will decay and fade if not protected. Books
should not be stored or subjected to direct sunlight. Your storing room should have the curtains or blinds drawn when not in use.

Infestation There are several critters that are attracted to the component parts of books (starches, glues and paper) such as silverfish, book lice, cockroaches, bookworms, rats and mice. The tell tale signs are small piles of brown dust or bite marks. If you observe any of these symptoms then you should consult a pest control expert immediately.

These simple considerations will ensure the successful storage and promote longevity of any book. Further articles on the topic of book collecting,
Common book terminology and how to identify first editions are available at
bid4abook.co.uk .



--
John Harvey has been an avid collector of rare and antique books for several years. In 2005 he started up his own antique and rare book auction site bid4abook.co.uk. The site is free for buyers and sellers of books.

Source: http://www.articletrader.com ]]>