• Customer: Meteorological Office.
• Title: The Posthumous Works of Robert Hookes.
• Author: ( Published by ) R.Waller.
• Size: 326mm x 216mm x 51mm.
• Date of book: 1705.
• Condition received: Mid / dark brown calf full binding.
• Tight-back style of binding.
• Both boards are loose from main text.
• Corners of the boards and parts of the sides of the boards have worn through the leather and even missing.
• Main block intact with only a few pages torn.

Proposed action:

• Remove the leather spine.
• As it is a tight-back binding there is a possibility it will not come off in one piece therefore it may have to be removed in sections.
• Remove old glues from spine.
• Clean and repair pages where necessary.
• Repair leather corners with paste and leather inserts.
• Make a new case using leather to match original as closely as possible.
• Case in the text block.
• Attach original spine.
• Feed original leather with leather dressing.

• Title: Pilgrims Progress.
• Author: John Bunyan.
• Size: 133mm x 221mm x 40mm.
• Date of book: 1814.
• Condition received: Both boards missing.
• All of the spine missing apart from the odd fragment of leather.
  (It is a tight-back binding with leather stuck directly to spine.)
• Main text holding together.
• Front and back sections loose.
• Text edges very dirty.
• Majority of pages very dirty.

Proposed action:

• Remove fragment of leather to use as colour match later.
• Remove old glues.
• Unpick every section and folio.
• Dry clean each folio.
• Acquaeous clean every folio.
• De acidify every folio.
• Resize every folio.
• Once dry resew on cord.
• Attach navy marbled endpapers.
• Add new glues.
• Sponge colour edges in gold and light blue.
• Sew double headbands on top and tail with light blue, navy and gold threads.
• Add linings and false bands.
• Make up case out of mid calf leather to match fragment.
• Use calf to make a full binding.
• Hand tool William Morris design on sides with similar design on spine.
• Hand tool lettering on spine.
• Hand tool the square of the inside of the boards.
• All tooling to be 24 carat gold.
• Case in text block.
• Make a brown cloth drop-back box with felt lining to house the finished binding.
• Letter the box in gold on brown calf leather.

Summary

• Customer: Meteorological Office.
• Title: Cook’s Voyages. Third Voyage, Volume Two.
• Size: 300mm x 48mm x 241mm.
• Date of book: 1784.
• Condition received: Full brown calf binding.
• Tree marbling design on covers.
• Front and back boards are detached.
• The spine is in one piece apart from the head caps.
• Headbands top and tail are both missing.
• Endpapers are traditionally marbled.
• Text block edges are very dirty.
• The text block as a whole is in good condition.
• Corners of the boards are worn and showing the actual boards in places.
• There are white stickers on the front board.

Proposed action:

• Remove spinal leather .
• Remove old glues and linings from the spine.
• Remove white stickers from the front board.
• Delicately clean the edges of the text block.
• Sew new headbands to match colours from the remaining small fragments found tucked inside the sections.
• Repair corners with paste and leather inserts where needed.
• Make new case incorporating the original boards.
• Case text block in with the original endpapers and cloth joints for strength.
• Reattach the original spine.
• Feed leather binding with leather dressing.

• Customer: Meteorological Office.
• Title: Royal Meteorological Society. Photographs of stations.
• Size : 305mm x 42mm x 373mm.
• Date of book: 1887.
• Condition received: Half binding in dark green goat skin with dark green cloth sides.
• The case is in good condition.
• Leather label tooled on front cover.
• Majority of pages breaking off from main spinal area.
• In many places where the for edge of the pages has disintegrated white tape has been attached.
• Corners of the pages are brittle.
• Endpapers are triple papers.
• Approximately 30 pages with photographs and captions.
• The pages have either 6 photographs (small 100mm x 72mm) or 2 photographs ( large 198mm x 142mm ).
• All pages are extremely fragile.

Proposed action :

• Remove text from case.
• Remove old glues from spine.
• Detach remaining pages from the spine.
• Lift white tape from pages delicately to minimise damage.
• Place each sheet into a made to measure melinex pocket.
• This will protect the document from outside risks.
• The melinex has a margin for sewing.
• Sew the text block together using melinex strips as spacers.
• Use new glues and linings.
• Attach headbands top and tail.
• The text has now tripled in size due to the melinex additions, adjust original binding to fit the larger text block.
• Reattach the case to the text block.
• Feed leather with leather dressing.

(This book was later filmed during the BBC 2, “Weather” programme.)