My biblionautic chums and friends.
The first week workshop at the wonderful Flatford Mill of the year.
A little information about the location and venue....Flatford Mill is the first and original field studies centre https://www.field-studies-council.org/about-us/which was set up in the UK during the 1940’s. It is the centre for Constable Country, set amidst the quintessentially English countryside of the Dedham Vale in Suffolk and sitting on the banks of the River Stour. Flatford Mill runs residential field study visits for school students and provides a very wide range of natural history along with art and craft courses, which include... of course.... Bookbinding. https://www.field-studies-council.org/courses-and-experiences/static-courses/bookbinding-for-beginners-and-improvers/
Residential students stay in internationally important buildings such as Willy Lotts’ House, (built in the 1500’s and made famous by John Constable’s ‘Haywain’ painting), Valley Farm (a medieval great hall built in the 1450’s) and of course the Mill itself that was owned and renovated by the Constable family in the 1700’s.
As usual, a mixture of complete beginners and those with experience. When I say complete beginners... never picked up a bone folder etc.
We learn so much, the nature of paper, making our own adhesives, thread and wax, folding sections and so forth. And, if I may, I would like to answer a question that I am often asked... That is why do I start with a multisectional case bound book... My thoughts are that so much is learnt with the Multisectional Case Bound book that when the student looks at simpler binding styles such as the single single section, the student is able to look at the single section (for example) understand how it is made by being able to reverse engineer, as it were. The concertina book and the other structures that beginners are often subject to become childs play.....
In addition, nothing is in kit form, I feel that all kits do is to teach the student how to assemble kits. My students learn how to measure, cut board by hand (how many beginners have a board chopper?), manipulate and manage the various materials to maximise use. We learn not just how but why, we follow, where we can, the Arts and Crafts ethos. Examples of the period back up the practical experience. For example.. To wean the student of the machine cut edge (if you want a book to look machine made, buy a machine made book) to appreciate the beauty of the uncut- untrimmed text block... To embrace the allure of the handmade.
The teaching/learning is immersive, full on, and, as so many of the students have said in the past..... intensive (by intensive they mean that they are tired at the end of the day, indeed as I am after some 9 hours of tuition a day).
.jpeg)