The Four Gospels. New commission.

The Four Gospels... A re-print of the famous Four Gospels by The Golden Cockerel Press. Fantastic stuff, lavish with the work of Gill, it does really deserve a place in the top 4 of the all time greats.
Originally intended as one volume, I have split the book in to four (lots more work) Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The end papers have all ready been printed, the text block sewn and now it is time for the edge decoration and end banding.

First is the application of a base colour. Purple, purple is often associated with royalty and God. During my research I have found that colours have as much meaning as the symbols and signs in Christian art.



Next is the modern Gauffering. Bronze foil is layed over the edge and tooled with a hot brass tool. The secret is to have a hot tool, pressure must be light as there is the risk of the edge being damaged. Of course if you are wanting a heavy texture to the edge then by all means press away... practise first. Patience is the key.



Last is the end banding. I have decided that I wanted to keep the endbanding as simple as possible. I have thought for a long time that the strength of the end band is in the tie downs. The wrapping of the silk or what ever around the core is for decoration. So, remembering to keep it simple I pared a lot of leather very thin. I then rolled up these thin pieces of leather into mini Swiss rolls. A number of these rolls where then placed side by side and sandwiched between some purple (again) and red leather. The whole lot was then pressed to a 3mm thickness and allowed to dry.

I used a thin PVA (Fevicole in India) and worked as quickly as possible.

This block of swiss rolls was the cut in to 2mm strips to form the end band core. Sewn only at the tie downs (the middle of each section) with silk (purple....again!) What the image does not show are the beads on the tie downs.. in red silk (red is for emotions. Love, hate, blood etc)