By Amy Richards.
So many books of the present day have decorative book covers especially designed to fit each book that many people who buy the books are beginning to ask what suggests these designs and how they are executed.
Having made book-cover designs for a number of years, I have been asked to write a practical account of how these book covers are made, which will give an answer to some of these questions. This account will have no bearing on the designs used on hand-bound books with their beautiful "tooled" covers. These are a different branch of the art altogether from the so-called "commercial bindings" which I am about to describe. The designs for these tooled covers are as a rule made by the same hands that bind the books.
Every year hundreds of books are published that need "commercial" book covers. In many cases these covers are used to help sell the book; that is, they must be attractive enough to draw attention to the book as it lies on the counter in the bookshops and other places where the book is on sale.
Some publishers have artists, regularly employed, to make their own designs exclusively; but as a rule each publisher keeps in touch with a number of designers, sending for one or the other as the needs of a particular book require. When a design is needed, the particular sort of cover required is discussed with the publisher, the number of colors that can be used is mentioned, also the exact dimensions of the book and the material to be used in binding the book. Almost every designer prefers to read the ma.n.u.script of the book, if possible, or to have a synopsis of it, for, naturally, he can make a much more suitable and successful cover if he has a complete idea of the subject of the book.
Having read the book, or having been told what it is about, the designer makes one or more rough sketches in color, giving a general idea of the book cover, both as to design, color scheme, and material to be used in binding. If one of these sketches is selected, the designer then makes an accurate "working" drawing, either in color, or black and white. If a black-and-white drawing is made, a rough color sketch is sent with it to indicate how the die is to be cut.
A finished book-cover design can be made on water-color paper, bristol-board, or a piece of book-cover linen. This last method is popular with publishers, as it shows them how the cover will look when finished. A designer keeps sample books of all the most popular bookbinding materials, which the manufacturers are glad to supply. A practical designer always chooses for the ground color of a design a cloth that is to be found at one of the regular book-cloth manufacturers.
When a book-cover design is finished, it is neatly mounted on cardboard and a careful note is written on the margin, telling how the design is to be executed by the binder, the kind of cloth to be used, and its number in a particular sample book. Unless the design is executed on a piece of book cloth, a sample of the cloth desired is pasted under the directions. The design is then cut in bra.s.s by a die cutter, as described in the next chapter, and the covers are stamped in gold or inks from this die by the binder. The design must be the exact size of the future book or drawn larger in exact proportion for reduction to the proper size.
Gold is of course the most expensive way of reproducing a cover design, and a publisher generally tries to get as good an effect as possible without the use of gold, or he limits its use to the t.i.tle lines or to a small part of the design. Four inks is usually the extreme number used, and more often only two or three are used, or gold and one ink.
Several styles of decoration are used in designing book covers; but they may be put roughly into two cla.s.ses,--those that are purely ornamental and those that are pictorial. Personally I am in favor of the purely ornamental cover, as being more dignified; but there are books that seem to require a pictorial cover that is treated somewhat in the fashion of a decorative poster.
A book-cover designer to be successful should be very versatile and able to make use of figures as well as thoroughly versed in the use of ornament.
One of the most important parts of a book cover is the t.i.tle, to which the amateur and inexperienced designer does not always give sufficient attention. The t.i.tle must be clearly drawn and everything else in the cover made subservient to it, so that the first thing the eye falls on is the t.i.tle. For this reason a thorough study of lettering is necessary for the successful cover designer, and much practice in order to become proficient. A very successful cover may be due simply to a well-selected cloth with lettering properly drawn and placed so that the eye is perfectly satisfied and the whole has an air of distinction. Each designer grows insensibly into his or her own particular style, which those who are interested in book covers grow to know; but the more varied his style the more in demand will be the designer.
The designing of book covers is a minor art, but since there is a constant demand for ornamented covers, the more taste and skill that can be devoted to the making of them, the better. When one looks back to the covers of fifteen years ago, one realizes what an advance has been made, and that the standard has been raised higher and higher, until at the present time many a famous ill.u.s.trator or decorative painter occasionally turns his or her hand to the designing of book covers.
THE COVER STAMPS
By George Becker.
Not many years ago the crudest and most primitive devices were used in the production of a book cover. The artist, if such he could be called, who was responsible for the design, seldom went to the trouble of furnishing the engraver with anything more than a pencil sketch, which the latter transferred to a bra.s.s plate about one-quarter of an inch thick by coating the plate with beeswax and laying the sketch on it, face downward. When the paper was removed the beeswax retained the marks of the lead pencil. He then began the tedious process of outlining it by hand with a graver and afterward finished it with a chisel.
But the exacting demands of modern artistic taste, the improvement of scientific methods and the pressure of compet.i.tion have marked a complete transformation in the business of making dies for book covers. A few pencils and gravers, a vise bench, and a grindstone no longer make an engraving establishment. Colored sketches of most painstaking execution, accompanied by a working drawing in black and white, have taken the place of the old pencil sketch. These artistic productions, having pa.s.sed the ordeal of critical examination, are handed over to the photographer, who, if he understands his part, does all that the beeswax did, and a good deal more. He takes the black-and-white drawing above referred to and reproduces it, in the size desired, directly on a bra.s.s plate covered with a sensitive coating, and then having prepared it with acid-proof preparations, he pa.s.ses it over to the etcher.
The etcher in his turn, with unerring judgment in the strength of his acids, does what the most careful outliner could not accomplish; he produces a perfect facsimile of the original drawing, with all its artistic freedom. The process used is practically the same as the zinc etching process described in the chapter on half-tones and line plates. The plate, having been etched as deep as is safe, is then turned over to the router, whose business it is to cut out all the metal between ornaments and lettering to the proper depth. This done, the engraver, who in former years practically dug out the entire plate with his hand tools, comes in to give the finishing touches and correct any slight imperfection that may remain. It is of the utmost importance, of course, that the dies should be clear-cut and deep, to avoid clogging up in printing, particularly in the plates used for stamping in inks. The experienced and watchful engraver is expected to detect any spots where the etching process has not fully accomplished its purpose. Lettering, especially, should be cut clear, deep, and free from "feather," or ragged edges.
The above process applies to single plates or to plates intended for printing in one color only, or in gold. Where two or more colors are wanted, the photographer has to make as many prints as there are colors in the artist"s design, as each one calls for a separate plate.
The proceeding otherwise remains the same, excepting that to the engraver"s task is added the necessity of making sure of a perfect register or fitting together of the various parts.
The transformation in the demands of publishers and writers has become so great since the days of the primitive little shop above referred to, that a die cutter, working on those lines, would be hopelessly out of the race at the present day. In order to meet satisfactorily the artistic expectation of the present generation a first-cla.s.s engraving establishment must have: an accomplished staff of artists, supplied with a library of standard authorities on the various schools of art, as well as a good selection of modern art publications; a skilled photographer with a complete photographic outfit, including, of course, a suitable gallery with the best obtainable light, both natural and artificial; and lastly a complete staff of routers and engravers, some of whom should be specialists in lettering, while others should devote their attention exclusively to figures.
Of all the elements that go to make book-cover decoration the lettering is by far the most important. It should receive special care, as in some cases it const.i.tutes the entire decoration. In this respect the critical taste of the present day shows itself even more strongly than in the matter of decorative ornamentation, and no amount of ornamentation, whatever its artistic value, can redeem a cover whose lettering is lacking in style, character, or typographical merit of some kind. Experience is such a good teacher that I can usually tell, by looking at a die, not only who designed the lettering, but also what workman engraved it.
Some dies are intended for stamping in gold or colored leaf and consequently have to be heated sufficiently to cause the leaf to adhere to the cloth cover, while others are meant simply for black stamping or stamping in ink of various colors; but all are engraved on bra.s.s for the sake of durability. Sometimes, where very large editions are expected, as of school books, steel is subst.i.tuted for bra.s.s.
The die, when finished, is used by the binder in a stamping press.
Color work calls for considerable skill on the part of the stamper, who should be an expert in mixing inks as the best-cut die will often show poor results if not properly handled. In fact, the success of a book cover depends on three individuals,--the artist who designs it, the engraver who cuts it, and the stamper who prints it.
BOOK CLOTHS
By Henry P. Kendall.
The great increase in the number of books produced each year has brought a corresponding development in the use of prepared cloth for the bindings. Previous to the beginning of the last century cloth was almost unknown as a material for covering a book. Books were then very costly. They were printed laboriously by hand, on paper also made by hand, and were naturally considered worthy of the most lasting bindings. As the life of books depends on the strength and wearing quality of the covers, such materials as wood, vellum, and leather, often reenforced with metal, were generally used.
The nineteenth century has marked a great progress in the variety and quant.i.ty, if not in the quality, of published books. Improvements in methods and in machinery have progressed side by side with economies in paper making. As the cost of producing the printed sheets became less, a demand arose for a correspondingly cheaper material for bindings. The want was satisfactorily met by the use of cloth, and from the day that it was first used it has become more and more a factor in book manufacturing.
When so commonplace a binding material as cloth was selected, artists and binders and publishers considered that ornamentation on such a material was almost a waste of time and money. So the libraries of our grandfathers contained rows of gloomy and unattractive books, bound in black cloth stamped in old-fashioned designs, with a back t.i.tle of lemon gold, and it is only comparatively a few years ago that binding in cloth began to be considered worthy of the attention of the designer and the artist, but since then the demand for a more varied a.s.sortment and a wider choice of colors and patterns has been steadily growing.
Let us consider briefly the different kinds of book cloths that are most commonly used to-day and try to make clear to the lay reader the different fabrics, whose nomenclature is so frequently confused even by binders and publishers.
Book cloths, from their appearance and manufacture, fall into two natural divisions, the first being the so-called "solid colors," in which the threads of the cloth are not easily distinguishable. This division contains two grades of cloth, generally known as common colors and extra colors. The standard width of all book cloths is thirty-eight inches. The commons and extras are sold by the roll, and the standard number of yards to the roll of these fabrics is thirty-eight.
The second division consists of the so-called "linens" and "buckrams,"
in which each thread, with the imperfections and peculiarities of the weaving, are plainly seen and form a large part of their picturesque effect.
The first of the "common colors" to be used was the black cloth already referred to, but they are now made in many colors, though chiefly in simple, p.r.o.nounced shades, such as browns, blues, greens, and reds. These cloths have been dyed, and sized with a stiffening preparation. They are the cheapest of the solid colors and are used in various patterns, which are embossed on the surface during the process of manufacture.
The ordinary patterns which are in the greatest use to-day are designated in the trade by letters. Perhaps the most familiar is the "T" pattern, straight parallel ridges or striations, about forty to the inch, and running across the cloth from selvage to selvage. When properly used, these ribs run from top to bottom of a book cover. For this reason it is not economical to use the "T" pattern if the height of the cover is not a multiple of the width of the cloth, as it results in a waste of cloth. This explains why the cost of the book bound in "T" pattern is frequently somewhat higher than the same book bound in another pattern of the same cloth.
A similar design is the "S" or silk pattern, made up of finer lines running diagonally across the cloth, giving the surface a sheen somewhat resembling silk. Also in common use are a group of patterns composed of small irregular dots or points, the finest of which is known as the "C" pattern, a coa.r.s.er pattern of similar design, the "J," and, coa.r.s.er still, the "L," which has somewhat the appearance of the coa.r.s.e grain of a morocco leather. The pattern known as "H" is a simple diamond made by intersecting diagonal lines similar to the ribs of the "T" pattern. Other patterns in less common use are those resembling morocco leather, pigskin, and patterns in fancy designs.
Following the increased use of the common cloths, attention was given to the artistic effects which might be obtained by using colored inks and gold on lettering and design, and also to the effect obtained by pressure of hot binders" dies or stamps upon covers made with embossed cloths, which latter process is known in binding as "blanking" or "blind" stamping.
With these advances in the art of cover decoration came the demand for the more delicate tints and richer shades of the colors, and as a result finer colors than could be produced in the common cloths were introduced to meet this demand; these fabrics were called the "extra"
cloths. They have a solid, smooth surface, more "body," and are in every way firmer and better fabrics, and more costly, too, some of the shades costing from twenty to forty per cent more than the common cloths.
Extra cloths are used largely on the better cla.s.s of bindings, such as the popular fiction, holiday books, scientific books, and books of reference, and whenever fine coloring or a better appearance is desired. These cloths are chiefly used in the plain fabric, which is known as "vellum," and in the "T," "S," and "H" patterns. The trained eye easily recognizes extra cloth from the common cloths, by the appearance of the surface; but any one may readily distinguish them by the appearance of the back, which in the extra cloths is not colored, but in the commons is the same color as the face.
Of the second division of cloths, in which the appearance of the threads becomes a part of the effect, there are first the "linen"
cloths. The name "linen" applied to this group is really a misnomer, for many laymen are led to think that such cloths have flax as a foundation and are therefore genuine linens. This is not so, for there is but one genuine linen book cloth to be had, and that is a coa.r.s.e, irregularly woven cloth, dyed in dull colors, and manufactured by a foreign house. It is quite expensive, costing sixty cents a square yard, which is one of the reasons why it is seldom used.
The chief characteristics of the linen cloths are that the coloring used fills the interstices, but allows all the threads to be clearly seen. The irregularities of the weaving, therefore, stand out plainly, and produce to a certain extent the appearance of woven linen fabrics.
Linen book cloths are made in two grades, and are sold by the yard under special names given to them by the manufacturers. The cheaper grade is sold under the name of "vellum de luxe," "X" grade, or "Oxford." A better grade of linen book cloth sells (in 1906) at about sixteen cents per yard under the names "art vellum," "B" grade, and "linen finish." It is a very durable fabric and extensively used.
The linen cloths are made princ.i.p.ally in the plain surface, and in the "T" pattern, but almost never in any other patterns, the reason for this being the fact that the character of the cloth is very little changed by the embossing, which is used with greater effect on the solid colors. These linen cloths are especially adapted for school and other books which are constantly handled, as their construction shows the wear less than do the solid colors.
The buckrams might have been properly cla.s.sed with the linens, as that is what, in fact, they are. Linen cloth observed through a microscope which magnifies the threads to a coa.r.s.eness of about forty to the inch gives us the exact appearance of the buckram, which is a heavy, strong cloth well adapted to large books, and which furnishes the most durable binding of all the book cloths. The colors of buckrams correspond closely with those of the linens; they are also sold under trade names given them by manufacturers, such as "art canvas" and "E"
grade.
Buckrams are sometimes embossed to imitate in part the appearance of an irregularly woven fabric called "crash." Crash is a special cloth which might properly be cla.s.sed with the buckrams, and when suitably used is a very artistic material.