Bookbinding Tutorials by Nick Cowlishaw on DVD

Nick Cowlishaw served a six year hand bookbinding apprenticeship and has been a professional bookbinder ever since, with 50 years of experience in the craft.

He taught craft bookbinding at the London College of Printing for 18 years, and part time at Morley College London for a further 14 years.

He has recently issued a set of 3 DVD bookbinding tutorials which cover all the essential procedures involved in sewing and forwarding, case binding and binding in half and full leather.

I came across Nick many years ago, back in 1986 he was teaching a master class, and I was a mature student.

I have known of him for 27 years. I met him fairly recently through one of his first DVD bookbinding tutorials "Rebacking a Cloth Binding", a really excellent tutorial that has had a lot of good feedback. 

In these videos, Nick works in a very uncluttered workspace, nothing to distract the eye. It is easy to concentrate on what is being taught, and what a lot is taught! The three DVD's cover the forwarding and binding of four standard styles of binding, from the simple flat back case binding to the durable traditional binding in full leather.

Vol 2. Case Binding, could stand on it's own, it's a complete course on how to produce two high quality case bindings.

Vol 1 & 3 Forwarding & The Leather Binding, properly belong together I feel, Vol 1 teaching you everything up to the point of covering, and Vol 3 taking you from there to produce two styles of leather binding.

The set of three bookbinding tutorials represent a thorough grounding in forwarding and binding.

There is a DVD on titling and tooling in gilt and gold in the pipeline.

You can tell Nick taught binding for so many years, he's a good teacher, he imparts what he has to say clearly. and appears relaxed and at home.

At last on DVD. How to properly use the plough and press to trim your books!

And another thing, he served an apprenticeship, you could do worse than adopt the language of bookbinding he teaches.

These are genuinely good DVD bookbinding tutorials. 

  Vol.1 Forwarding

This comprehensive DVD carefully shows the various stages in forwarding a book, from folded sections, sewing the book on a sewing frame, right up to the covering stage and everything in between. Nothing is excluded.

Some of the techniques demonstrated are sewing on a frame, rounding and backing, two & three colour endband sewing and board attachment.

See contents below for a full list of subjects covered.

Two DVD set, running time over 2 hours.

This DVD is compatible with both NSTC & PAL formats.

Disc 1                                                               Disc 2                               

Making end papers and sewing Rounding and backing

Setting the sewing frame Board cutting and attachment

Plaiting a skein of thread                                     Cutting the boards

Sewing the sections of the book Preparing the boards for attachment

The weavers knot Board attachment

Removing the text block from the frame End bands

Sewing on the end papers Two colour sewing

Board preparation Three colour sewing

Spine Preparation                                               Spine lining

Reducing spine swell Hollow back

Tipping down end papers and sections Raised bands

Spine gluing

Edge trimming

Price £53.28  including registered postage to Europe and the USA. Shipping surcharges apply for other destinations, please inquire for details.

    

  Vol.2 Case Binding

Case Binding involves the production of books which do not have the more complicated structure of full leather bindings. Two styles of case binding are demonstrated, flat backed and rounded.

An exhaustive description of the process's used to make the two standard styles of case binding. Two seminal styles of sewing. And at last on DVD, how to use the Plough & Press for trimming your books.

See contents below for a full list of subjects covered.

Two DVD set, running time over 2 hours.

This DVD is compatible with both NSTC & PAL formats.

Disc 1 Disc 2

Flat back case binding Rounded and backed case binding

Folding sections Sewing on tapes

French sewing End papers

End papers End paper attachment

Gluing the spine Gluing the spine

Ploughing the foredge Trimming the book

Ploughing the head and tail Rounding & backing

Making the case Lining the spine

Casing in Making the case

  Casing in

   Final checks

Price £53.28  including registered postage to Europe and the USA. Shipping surcharges apply for other destinations, please inquire for details.

    

 Vol.3 Leather Binding

This DVD will show you precisely how to bind a book in both half and full leather. It shows in detail the sequence of operations needed to cover a full leather binding in goatskin.

This DVD follows on from the DVD on Forwarding and Case Binding. It covers everything, cutting and paring leather for full and half style bindings, how to mould the headcaps, laying down endpapers.

See contents below for a full list of subjects covered.

Two DVD set, running time over 2 hours.

This DVD is compatible with both NSTC & PAL formats.

Disc 1 Disc 2

Half binding Full binding

Cutting leather and paring Cutting leather and paring

Preparing for covering Paring leather

Covering Preparing for covering

Attaching the corners Slitting hollow and capping up

Spine attachment Back cornering and sanding

Turning in Covering

Setting the joints and caps Attaching cover

Trimming and siding Pleating the corners

Filling in Turning in and setting joints

Putting down endpapers Tying up and setting the caps

  Trimming out and filling in

  Trimming end papers

Price £53.28  including registered postage to Europe and the USA. Shipping surcharges apply for other destinations, please inquire for details.

 Vol.4 Cloth Rebacking

One of the most common problems with Victorian cloth bindings is damage to the spine and joints, leading to detaching of the boards.

This demonstration by one of the foremost bookbinding teachers will guide you through the procedures necessary to assess and repair such damage with the minimum cosmetic impact on the book.

110 minutes running time.

See below for full description of contents.

This DVD is available in NSTC or PAL formats.

NTSC if you are American, PAL if from the UK or Europe.

We will send you the correct format when we process your order.

Disc 1

A brief history of cloth.

Assessing the damage.

Paste washing.

Detaching the case.

Disassembling the case.

Cutting the slots.

Cleaning the spine.

Extension strips.

Lining the spine.

Corner repairs.

Reattaching the boards.

End turn-ins.

Putting down the flaps.

Putting down the extension strips.

Reattachment of the spine.

Price £44.56 including registered postage to Europe and the USA. Shipping surcharges apply for other destinations, please inquire for details.

EVERY MONTH I SEND OUT THE BOOKBINDERS DIGEST. WHICH AIMS TO BRING YOU INTERESTING ITEMS CONCERNING THE WORLD OF BOOKBINDING AND RELATED CRAFTS. IF YOU WOULD CARE TO SUBSCRIBE PLEASE JUST MAIL ME PUTTING "EDEN" IN THE SUBJECT LINE.

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