Julie Beinecke Stackpole
Thomaston, Maine
After receiving a B.A. in medieval and children's literature from Kirkland College, Julie Stackpole studied bookbinding with Kathryn Gerlach in Vermont, at the Centro del Bel Libro in Switzerland, at the Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts in London, England, and with Roger Powell in England. She established her independent bindery on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, in 1975, and moved to Maine in 1985. She creates unique design bindings and does rare book restoration and related conservation and bookbinding projects, primarily for private clients.
Example Binding:
Saint Francis of Assisi.
Il cantico delle creature di Francesco Di Assisi.
Italy: Officine tipografiche Errebi di Falconara, 2001.
Traditional-style full leather binding with tight joints and tight back, covered in natural (undyed) Niger goatskin over sculpted boards; upper and lower boards with onlays of multiple leathers embossed with linoleum cuts and with blind, gold, and silver tooling representing all aspects of creation for which Saint Francis gives praise in his canticle. Sewn on raised and flat bands, raised bands continuing onto the design of the boards. Gilded Japanese paper endpapers with leather hinges. Colored and tooled top edge, worked silk headbands.
Design Description:
Traditional-style tight-joint binding, sewn on seven raised bands covered in beige Niger goatskin and tooled with blind lines evocative of fifteenth-century blind-tooled bindings of the time when The Imitation of Christ was first published. Onlay of azure blue goatskin in an eighteenth-century shape on the front cover, echoed with blind tooling on the back cover, refers to the 1788 Didot printing of this edition. Linoleum cuts on both front and back covers in the style of fifteenth-century woodcuts, embossed in the leather and overlapping both colors on the front board. On front cover only, the linoleum cuts representing people from the author’s time and today imitating Christ. Endpapers will be chosen when the binding is complete, possibly Cockerell marbled papers with hinges, or a toned handmade paper. Gold tooled title in a typeface similar to that found in the 1788 printed text.
