Experimenting With Book Structures: Ben Elbel [Bookish Talk #26]

Aspects of running a bookbinder's supplies company as a family business Watch the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynUZozrlMbc 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start at only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. This summer, we had a chance to visit the headquarters of @Schmedt - The World of Bookbinding -- a well-known German producer and distributor of all things related to book craft! One of the reasons for our visit was to kickstart a partnership between iBookBinding and Schmedt. From now on, you can buy a selected line of iBookBinding tools in Schmedt's webshop. Specifically printed in the colors the customers of this German company are quite used to! =) In this video, we discuss the company's history, aspects of running a family business for several generations, finding a balance between selling to artisans and larger companies, and much more! In the second part of our talk, we continue this discussion and are invited for a tour of Schmedt's showroom and warehouse. Listen to this episode on: - Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/ibookbinding - iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/nl/podcast/ibookbinding-podcast/id1510257102 - Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5zb3VuZGNsb3VkLmNvbS91c2Vycy9zb3VuZGNsb3VkOnVzZXJzOjgxNTMwMzAwNS9zb3VuZHMucnNz Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ Schmedt: https://schmedt.com/ iBookBinding's tools in Schmedt's webshop: https://schmedt.com/brands/ibookbinding-tools/ 00:00 – Beginning 01:22 – How is it all begin - the history of the Schmedt family business 04:06 – Developing of The PräGnant machine - manual blocking press for one-off titles and name embossings 06:03 – Machine building’s part of the Schmedt’s business that started from a little workshop in the former stable 07:59 – Focus on the small bookbinders 09:35 – About trade binderies in Germany and other countries 11:37 – The International side of Schmedt’s business, participation in the printing equipment exhibition in Dusseldorf (The Drupa) 15:18 – The material part of business, starting webshop in 1997 17:20 – Modernization of the web shop nowadays 20:00 – Importance and advantage of personal presence in your own business processes 21:04 – The opportunities offered by the market in united Europe and worldwide 26:10 – Selling in small quantities of materials, the “hobby side” of the bookbinding market 27:34 – Business processes during the pandemic, the start of presenting machines via video calls 34:23 – Changes in perception and expectations from communication between sellers and clients nowadays 40:38 – Schmedt’s Machine’s display space in Hamburg 42:18 – Examples of digitally printed book edges

There's still time to send your binding! 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. We discuss the upcoming International Competition with two people in charge of it: Amy Kitcherside and Talitha Wachtelborn, book professionals from the UK. You still have time to make a book and join the competition until the beginning of May. Watch this episode on our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/yKbN0iwaOdM Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ More info: https://www.facebook.com/SoBcompetition https://twitter.com/sobcompetition https://www.societyofbookbinders.com/ 00:00 – Beginning 00:16 – The International Bookbinding Competition of The Society of Bookbinders 02:24 – What are the Competition categories, and who are the Judges? 06:40 – Delivery of books, catalog 08:01 – Will the public be able to see books from the Competition? 09:02 – The periodicity of The Society of Bookbinders Competition and desynchronization with the Designer Bookbinders Competition, the difference between two competitions 10:55 – More about book categories: what is the book or the book arts? 14:49 – Is there a size criteria of the book for the Competition, few words about the cases 17:19 – If Talitha and Amy wanted to enter the Competition, which category did they choose? 18:16 – More about the Restoration category 19:42 – Will be in the Competition something that fits with the Tomorrow's Past concept (modern conservation bindings for antiquarian books)? 21:45 – How many books are expected? 22:41 – The Geography of participants 26:06 – More about Historic Binding category

Come over to Sint-Niklaas on the 10th of April! 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. This time on Bookish Talk, we discuss the upcoming Boekbindbeurs België with Tanja Rakic from the Dutch seller of all sorts of bookish stuff Boektotaal. They have picked up the bookbinding fair in Sint-Niklaas from the previous organizer late in 2019 but haven't had a chance to run it since. So that's the first time for them and the 24th time for the Belgian fair! Please come over to Sint-Niklaas on the 10th of April if you are anywhere near. And even if not, while most of the visitors come from Belgium, the Netherlands, France, and the UK, there always are people coming from even further away! Watch this episode on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=In3bjdZxWec Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ Fair's website: https://www.boekbindbeurs.nl/en/content/sint-niklaas Boektotaal: https://www.boektotaal.nl/en/ 00:00 – Beginning 00:38 – How Boektotaal (store for bookbinders in Steenwijk, The Netherlands) become the organizer of the Bookbinders' Fair in Sint-Niklaas, Belgium 02:35 – Stepan's tour around Fair (April 2019) 06:06 – What is planned at the Fair this year? 07:25 – How many sellers would normally participate, and how many participants are expected this year? 08:26 – How long is the Fair, and how many people usually come? 10:03 – Boektotaal's representation at the Fair 10:40 – Who else will participate? Some names 13:03 – What was it like – organizing a Fair like this? 16:16 – The future plans for Boektotaal, a workshop for students in The Netherlands

Clay book, book on wheels, a book inspired by Andrei Sakharov, and more! 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. Pavel and I had a great opportunity to visit the library of the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art in Moscow and talk to its director Valerij Ledenev. He showed us some of the objects related to the history of the artist's books in Russia and walked us through the library's collection of modern artist's books. Including the objects from their Single Copy project, which aims to foster the development of the artist’s book. Watch this episode on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uix5zig7OY Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ Garage Museum of Contemporary Art: https://garagemca.org/en/ https://garagemca.org/en/programs/library 00:00 – Beginning 00:33 – Garage Museum of Contemporary Art Library's project "Single Copy" 01:50 – "Catalog of projects of art works in outer space. Planetary nebulae" by Rostan Tavasiev 06:59 – How the Collection of artistic books is displayed in the Museum's Library 07:45 – Book of the "DVR" Movement "The Age of Freedom" 12:14 – "The Whales inventory book of Bespamyatnykh S." by Sergey Bespamyatnykh 17:52 – Archives of the Garage Library 20:08 – What is the archival material and should be preserved 22:18 – One of the documents from the archive: the "Needle chair" made by the father of an artist Alexey Shchegolev with using son's old spray cans 24:24 – "The Fjord" by Ludmila Baronina – the "micro-museum" of an Artist in a book 28:32 – "The Journey of a red square" – the Leporello artistic book by Natalia Smolyanskaya 30:06 – Anton Gudkov's books with graphical works, "The Siberian mantra," "mail book" 37:18 – The book of street-art artist and Urban art researcher Igor Ponosov with fragments of advertising banners 41:10 – Evgeny Strelkov's book with the silk-screened prints on paper, onion skin paper, plastic, etc. referring to the Soviet atomic project and to the figure of Andrei Sakharov 45:35 – Six-meter hand drawn leporello book by Uliana Podkorytova 51:40 – Ceramic book by Mayana Nasybullova 55:25 – Musings about what we will leave as a legacy to the archaeologists of the future 01:02:46 – Curved book with wooden cover and star-shaped book by Andrey Olenev from "The Silence Workshop" 01:06:25 – What are Valery's ambitions and plans for this project?

We return to Angaea Cuna for a workshop tour and to talk about more bookish things! 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. We have already published two videos with our talks with Angaea Cuna, a bookbinder of Filipino descent who's residing and working in Hawaii. In this video, we discuss chemicals, bioarchitecture, the balance of life and death, and, yes, Angaea takes us for a tour of her studio. You can find this and the previous episodes here: https://www.youtube.com/c/iBookBinding/search?query=Angaea%20Cuna Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ Follow Angaea's projects: https://www.instagram.com/gaeabound/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjNP3Hajfp2K55PR3rQ9HGQ 00:00 – Beginning 00:28 – Short tour around Angaea’s studio 05:07 – Working in a makeshift manner 05:53 – Palm leave books 09:59 – Angaea’s videomaking and other art 13:04 – Bookbinding’s lessons for kids and comparison this experience with teaching adults 23:16 – Angaea’s bioarchitectural classes for kids 28:11 – Changes in book conservation: using less invasive materials and chemicals 30:08 – Mummies and use of chemicals through the history 38:06 – Understanding the balance of life and death that comes from connection with nature

The tour of Kate Holland's amazing studio and more! 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. In the second part of our talk with Kate Holland, we discussed education for bookbinders and the influence of art and craft on the economy. But most of the time we spend going around Kate's workshop and discussing tools, materials, and techniques. You can watch the video of this episode on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKPuwxUTxkM Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ Follow Kate Holland: Website: https://katehollandbooks.co.uk/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/katehollandbook/ 00:00 – Beginning 00:30 – Is there a chance for the appearance of long-term bookbinding education programs? 05:50 – The influence of the Arts on the economy 07:32 – Therapeutic side and the mental health aspect of the Arts and Crafts 11:21 – West Dean College of Arts and Conservation 15:13 – Bookbinding courses for kids 20:24 – Workshop tour 28:46 – The prototype of the book’s display case and the miniature of “A Beetle Assembly” by Jenny Whittle, bound by Kate Holland 30:52 – Continuation of the tour around the studio: more books, tools, etc. 35:18 – Lesson to the young bookbinders: “Don’t use a press like this” 37:39 – Dyeing leather 41:16 – Philip Smith’s old hand guillotine 41:43 – More materials and gadgets 49:15 – “Make your workshop as big as you can.” 50:59 – Musings about “the Zoom-skill” nowadays

We return to Tom McEwan to discuss the state of bookbinding in Scotland! 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. Watch the video version of this episode on our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/49HZssNznBY Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ Follow Tom's projects: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tmcewan/ Website: http://mcewan.co.uk/tm/ 00:00 – Beginning 00:44 – Earlier career 01:28 – Bookbinding in Scotland 08:21 – Teaching bookbinding in Scotland during the pandemic 10:38 – Bookbinding activities in the Glasgow School of Art 13:12 – Musings about when the design binding appeared and how to define the term “design binding.” 19:08 – Inspiration from surroundings landscape and nature of Scotland 25:13 – Influence of the previous profession: from the sculptor to bookbinder 27:26 – Titling the bindings 28:28 – Artistic techniques which help to show the orientation of the book

We continue our Booker Prize bindings series with Tom McEwan 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. This time we return to our Booker Prize bindings series to discuss the binding of A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam which was created by Tom McEwan. Tom is an award-winning bookbinder and the first Scottish guest on our podcast. It was a great pleasure to discuss his creative process. We have also recorded another episode of the podcast with Tom where we discuss his career and some aspects of being a bookbinder in Scotland. This video will be published later. Watch this episode on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21f0IUufTfQ Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ Follow Tom's projects: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tmcewan/ Website: http://mcewan.co.uk/tm/ 00:00 – Beginning 00:38 – Tom’s bindings made for the Booker Prize shortlist 01:38 – A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam 04:36 – How the sheets for the Booker Prize bindings arrived 05:20 – Beginning to work on the edge decoration 05:52 – Using the sheets of blank paper to fill in the shoulders of the book while pressing 06:33 – Where to start: design concept or directly binding 07:53 – Working on the edge 08:43 – Using gold foil for gold tooling 09:19 – Dyeing leather for the cover 14:53 – How many layers of color does Tom usually apply to his design bindings? 17:03 – How long does the first stage (dyeing, silk screen printing) of work takes? Using the hair dryer to speed up the process 19:42 – The finished binding 24:41 – Tom’s favorite part of the bookbinding process 27:42 – How does Tom know that his design is finished? 30:42 – Has Tom’s taste changed through the years? 32:00 – What if other people modify your bindings? Collaborations in bookbinding 34:42 – Tom’s attitude toward the boxes for the bindings 36:01 – Tom’s approach to making bindings for the Booker Prize shortlist 40:36 - Difference between binding old/famous and modern/brand new books 45:01 – Where in the world you can find Tom’s bindings

Do some experimental bookbinding! 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron (and get more content): https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. We return to Ben Elbel to talk about experimental bookbinding and unusual book structures. While this episode was recorded a while ago, it stays absolutely actual. Especially as Ben was named one of the most inspiring bookish people of 2021 by the guests of our podcast! Watch this episode on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jB4KPoBnsKE Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ Follow Ben's projects: Elbel Libro - https://www.elbel-libro.com/ Bookbinding Out of the Box - https://bookbindingoutofthebox.com/ https://www.instagram.com/bookbindingoutofthebox/ 00:00 - Beginning 00:25 - Space for creativity in the bookbinding process 02:40 - Ben’s experiments with book structure. Are there any unsolved problems and ways to improve the book’s structure? 06:43 - Experimenting as a way to give personality to a book 08:32 - Sticking to traditions vs. doing something completely new 10:33 - Places to study modern bookbinding 12:27 - Competitions in the field of experimental and innovational bookbinding 14:15 - Doing experimental bookbinding without loss of quality 15:11 - The bibliophile pleasure of traditional bookbindings

Designer Bookbinders UK Competition is well known all over the world 🔴 Support iBookBinding! Become a patron (and get more content): https://www.patreon.com/ibookbinding Pledges start with only $1 / €1 / £1 per month. This time we invited Kate Holland, an award-winning bookbinder from the UK, who is also one of the people in charge of the Designer Bookbinders UK Competition. Watch this episode on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCSGL6QI9Js Brought to you by iBookBinding. Bookbinding resources and tutorials: http://www.iBookBinding.com You can ask our future guests questions on: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/ibookbinding/ Discord — https://discord.gg/TJY5FeS Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/iBookBinding/ 00:00 – Beginning 01:16 – Designer Bookbinders: one of the foremost societies dedicated to the craft of fine bookbinding 02:28 – Being a Fellow of Designer Bookbinders 06:36 – Designer Bookbinders as a worldwide society 07:13 – DB UK Bookbinding Competition: Set Book 08:59 – The concept of “The winning binding” in bookbinding competitions 11:57 – Book arts competitions in the UK that have more acceptance towards the experimental structures 13:01 – DB UK Bookbinding Competition participants: who they are? (geography, gender, age) 15:55 – How the Pandemic affected DB UK Bookbinding Competition 20:44 – The sponsors of DB UK Bookbinding Competition 23:29 – The importance of organizing bookbinding competitions 24:40 – How long has the Competition and the Designer Bookbinders Society been in existence, and how did they change over time? 26:38 – Interaction of Designer Bookbinders society with the press and social media 28:50 – Postponing the Competition and the future schedule 30:05 – Being the participant of bookbinding competitions and the social aspects of being a Fellow of Bookbinders society (such as events) 33:58 – Kate’s personal experience of taking part in bookbinding competitions 36:56 – To follow or not to follow the news in bookbinding world: the influence of other’s works on an artistic view 38:03 – Sources of inspiration for work 39:11 – Current Licentiates of the Designer Bookbinders society 41:07 – Ways to attract new licentiates to the Society 43:26 – Kate’s bookbinding course structuring approach 45:13 – Difficulties of teaching the design aspects of bookbinding and the importance of having a life experience to develop an artistic view 49:34 – Ways to collect ideas and inspiration for designs