Book #83

Crisscross Binding,
formerly known as the Secret Belgian Binding

My book for today is an example of the lovely Crisscross Binding technique (which we used to call the Secret Belgian Binding).

If you are interested in reading more about this type of binding and its name, I have posted about it before here and here.

This particular journal is for sale in my Etsy shop.

The Morgan Art of Papermaking Conservatory

Last month, I had the opportunity to visit and teach at The Morgan Conservatory in Cleveland, Ohio. The Morgan was established approximately 7 years ago and, as its website states, it is "a non-profit art center dedicated to the production and preservation of hand papermaking and the art of the book."

The website doesn't seem to mention a date for when The Morgan was established, so my 7-year approximation is based on my memory of a presentation about The Morgan when it was still in its earliest development. There was a slideshow that consisted mostly of photos of an empty warehouse and Tom Balbo explaining how each corner of the building and the lot would be used in the future. That presentation was in 2008. Tom Balbo, a paper and ceramic artist, was the man behind that presentation and is now the executive director of the centre.

When I first arrived, I was given a tour of the facility and trust me, the magnitude of this place cannot be overstated. It's a big building, but they have also figured out how to make it seem bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. There is some office space, but much of the centre is dedicated to paper making. They do both Western and Eastern styles of papermaking so there is equipment for both, several beaters and tanks in many sizes and styles, large and small hanji tanks, and more molds and deckles than I've ever seen in one place before.

One of the small beaters.

Part of the mold and deckle collection.

A small hanji tank.

There is also an outdoor area where they are growing raw materials for some of their paper. They have created a kozo garden so they have been able to harvest their own kozo for making paper.

A bit of the Kozo garden.

There is also a gallery space, a bindery, and an extensive letterpress studio with several presses and tons of type. When I was visiting, the gallery space was being used for a letterpress exhibit.

Part of the gallery space.

Of course, I spent most of my time in the bindery area where I conducted two one-day workshops. The first day, I taught Anne Goy's Criss Cross binding (formerly known as the Secret Belgian Binding).

Books made in the workshop.

The second day was a Japanese bookbinding workshop where we did two different bindings: a multi section binding (seen here with the colourful Chyiogami cover papers) and a traditional account book structure.

Japanese books made in the workshop.

The workshops were great and I really enjoyed my time there. Thanks to The Morgan for this opportunity (and thanks to Fran for hosting and housing me). Anyone who is interested in papermaking and book arts should add this place to their "to do" list and visit if you find yourself in Cleveland. They have an impressive list of workshops continuing throughout the summer too (more info on their website).

If you'd like to see a few more pictures that I took or a whole bunch of photos that were taken by the staff at The Morgan during my workshops, you can visit my page on Facebook or The Morgan's facebook page.

May Workshops at The Morgan Conservatory

The Morgan Conservatory in Cleveland, Ohio has just announced their Spring and Summer workshops for 2014. It is an incredible lineup, I think there are 28 different workshops this time around! You can check out the entire list on their website:
http://morganconservatory.org.

I'm excited to be part of the fun. I'm going to be in Cleveland in May, checking out the Morgan Conservatory in person. Then I'm going to teach a couple workshops for them! The first one is May 24th, 2014. I'll be doing a workshop on the Secret Belgian Binding. Details and registration information here: morganconservatory.org/event/secret-belgian-binding/.

Then on May 25th, I'll be teaching a Japanese Bookbinding workshop where we will cover two lesser-known Japanese structures. Details and registration info here: http://morganconservatory.org/event/japanese-bookbinding/

Secret Belgian Binding -> Criss Cross Binding

As I mentioned a couple months ago, it is now known that the 'Secret Belgian binding' was invented by Anne Goy in the 1980s. It is not an obscure historical binding as many people thought. I had a little note directly from Anne after I posted here, and she says that she wants this binding to be called "Criss Cross binding" -- rather than the secret Belgian Binding. It's going to be hard to convince people to change their name for this structure, I think, but I wanted to share that information so that we can at least make an effort to call it by its proper name!

Secret Belgian Binding - not a secret anymore

A few years ago, I posted on my blog a list of historical bindings that I wanted to revisit. One of the bindings on that list was the Secret Belgian Binding. The history of this binding was obscure and, other than it being somehow Belgian in origin, nobody seemed too sure about it. As it turns out, it's not even an historic binding!

Hedi Kyle and Emily Martin were both at PBI last month, and they have been the unofficial experts on this binding. So, as I'm sitting across the lunch table from these two, I made some mention of the Secret Belgian Binding. I don't remember my question, and it doesn't matter, because the two of them became excited about telling me the important news: they found the person who invented this binding! Anne Goy invented the Secret Belgian Binding - and she does indeed, live in Belgium.

In the 1980s, Anne Goy developed this binding because she really liked the look of the Japanese stab bindings, but wanted a structure that would open fully. She showed the binding structure to a few people, they showed a few people, and they showed a few people, etc. Eventually the origin of the structure was obscured but its popularity had spread across the globe.

Thank you, Anne Goy!

Secret Belgian Binding for Uwe

Over at the Book Arts Forum, I discovered that there was a book swap going on! So I jumped on board for the latest round. A few weeks ago, I made a blank book using the Secret Belgian Binding and sent it off to Germany.


The fabric on the spine and corners is some drapery fabric that I backed with mulberry paper and I matched it up with this other leafy Japanese paper. I am usually not so brave to combine prints like this, but I do like it.


There is a discussion thread over the Book Arts Forum concerning the Secret Belgian Binding and several links have been posted to information about this kind of book. Today Uwe shared a link that he found to this Secret Belgian Binding tutorial. I am amazed that it is being done so differently than the way I do it! I took several photos of Uwe's book as I was making it and it is my intention to post a tutorial here...but that will take some time to prepare. I am now intrigued about this other approach to the structure...must investigate...

Fluffy Secret Belgian Binding

This is another one of the group of non-leather books I made recently. A few years ago, I acquired this amazing fabric from a box of stuff at my mom's house but never did anything with it. So I decided to finally use it. Obviously I also decided to experiment with the fluffy stuff too. I wanted to do the visible sewing in green, and this Turkish fibrous stuff was the perfect colour so I decided to try it. Since the textblock is sewn separately, it is still bound using ordinary linen bookbinding thread. So although the characteristic thread pattern isn't as obvious, the yarn still works adequately for attaching the covers and spine pieces like this.

Secret Belgian Binding

The Secret Belgian Binding was my next project on the list of historical bindings to do. I wish I knew more about the history of this binding; there is very little information available online and none of my books have any details.

I learned this in a class with Susan Mills. I believe the binding was unearthed by Hedi Kyle, and it has been dated between the 14th and 16th centuries. Story is, this type of binding had been long lost and forgotten until Hedi came upon it and she figured out how it was done. It is thought that it was a special binding method of a particular binder so it was never widely known. If you have any more authoritative information about this, please let me know. Don't bother sending me the Wikipedia link because I wrote that myself.

Now I remember why it has been so long since I did it. It's too tedious! But, nonetheless, I persevered and completed these two black and whites this week. I cheated a little bit. The covers are covered with self-adhesive papers - so I didn't have to wait for any glue or paste to dry. But they turned out fine, the proportions are nice, at 480 pages thick, and nice to hold. I still don't want to start making them very often, though.