Receiving a conservation project is very much like receiving a patient. The book, map, document, or newspaper clipping has a history and comes with its own unique challenges and care needs. The object needs to be examined, its history consulted, a diagnosis made, and a treatment plan formulated.

Last month, UCT Special Collections welcomed a true book surgeon. The innovative book conservator, Emma Fraser, visited UCT Special Collections to train the small but growing Conservation Unit team. During her time with us, Emma expertly demonstrated how to repair our newest patient, a leather-bound book.

Repairing a book is a challenge of skill, heart, and will. And also requires blood, sweat, and deft fingers. The books we usually get have seen a lot of wear and tear. Loose hinges and worn covers, stained and marked from all the hands that have handled it over the years.

The Conservation Unit receives these well-loved books once they are no longer stable enough to be handled by the general public and are at risk for further damage. The goal is to stabilise these books, so they can go back into circulation and be handled for many more years to come. It is important to note that conservators are the general surgeons of the heritage world and not the plastic surgeons. Conservators do not restore books to their original condition; they repair and stabilise. They restore strength to weak structures, repair loose covers,  torn pages, flatten folds, and stop deterioration in its tracks. They tend to love the age and history of a worn book, and prefer to keep the wear but not the tear. 

The marks, colour, doodles, and writing tell the story of all the loving hands that have endeavoured to read the book. The wear hints at where the book has been, its story as an object, and what it has meant to people. It adds value, whether historical or sentimental. However, the degree of interventive treatment or how much we work on the book depends on the owner or custodian of the book.

In this case, the custodian was UCT Special Collections, and the patient was an approximately A4 red-bound French-language Dictionnaire De L’Ameublement, a beautifully illustrated book about furniture and interior design. The book was bound with both red book cloth and a dark red leather. The book cloth, mostly on the covers, had faded and discoloured with time. The leather, on the spine and corners of the book cover, was beautifully embossed with gold lettering and lined decorations; however, the leather had been scratched, abraded, and torn. The leather spine was loose and hanging off on one side, only held by a few threads, which later broke off, detaching the spine completely. There were also a couple of pages and one gorgeously marbled endpaper at the back of the book that were torn and detached from the book. But besides that and a layer of dust, the book was in fair condition. There was hope, it could be repaired and returned to the collection.

Once we assessed the condition and documented the book, we decided on a treatment plan. It is a crucial practice for conservators to document the object and the conservation work that will be done on the object. This practice records any damage or deterioration and provides information for monitoring changes in the condition of the object over time. The information on materials and methods used to repair the object also helps future conservators to reverse treatments or helps them understand what treatments will be compatible with previous treatments.

The first thing we did, which is always the first step, was to dry clean the book. We used a soft brush to firmly but gently brush any dirt or accretions off the surface of the book. This can sometimes be a lengthy process, with some books requiring each individual page to be brushed clean. However, this book only needs a light cleaning because we wanted to stabilise the abraded leather of the book by consolidating each scratch and abrasion using a conservation-grade glue known as Klucel G. And before any adhesive could be applied, the surface needed to be clean. Klucel G is amazing for consolidating abraded leather. As Emma attests, the adhesive, lightly applied with a paintbrush, prevents the leather from further abrasion, keeping those fragile edges intact, while also not darkening the leather like other adhesives.

After we stabilised the cover, we moved onto the spine. Before we could re-adhere the spine, we had to remove the old, grungy spine board and failing glue. This is one of the more satisfying steps in book repair and is done by applying a thick layer of wheat starch paste adhesive to the old board. This poultice is then covered and left to soften the hard, dry board. Wheat starch paste is one of the most used adhesives in book repair as it is reversible, can be made to any desired consistency, and creates a strong, reliable bond. Once the glue had softened the board, we used a book surgeon’s most trusted tool to scrape the board off – the versatile butter knife.

Emma then helped us prepare the spine and boards of the book for a re-attachment technique that she invented. This technique is truly magical. It is a minimal intervention method that uses bookbinding needles and awls to make specifically angled holes into the book boards, under the leather, where linen thread will literally be sown, first into the spine supports and then the boards, creating a near invisible attachment between the original sewing, text block and the boards. 

While sewing, the book started to split at the spine, to avoid this complication, we adhered strips of Japanese paper vertically along the spine with a very thin layer of wheat starch paste. Using a hard bristled stencil brush, the paste was then distributed and the paper moulded onto the spine, creating an extra layer of support.

This book, as a patient, was particularly challenging as its cover boards were unusually hard to make holes in, teaching us a lot of patience in the process. (We never used the word ‘holes’ more than during this process!). Eventually, we succeeded in creating the holes and sewing the thread into the spine and boards. We used a light dab of wheat starch paste onto the threads when we did the last sewing and pulled the threads tight, so the new attachments would hold. Then we cut the loose threads, and hammered the ends flat, turning nearly any evidence of stitching in the boards invisible – an innovative marvel!

Emma then showed us how to make a new spine board and hollow spine, so the leather spine could be re-attached. We first placed the book in a bookbinder's vice to hold the book as we worked. Then we used Japanese paper and wheat starch paste adhesive to line the spine. Japanese paper is great for this as it is a long-fibred, strong paper that is easily moulded to surfaces such as the rigged spine. A strip of Japanese paper was measured, cut using a butter knife, and moulded onto the spine using a bone folder to evenly distribute the thin layer of wheat starch paste. A bone folder, traditionally made from bone, is a dull, flat bookbinder's tool used for a variety of purposes, particularly flattening. A section of the Japanese paper was left to be folded into a tube onto the spine and adhered to form a hollow spine. This was then left to dry. Drying is one of the most time-consuming processes in book repair.

While we waited, we carefully mixed watercolour paint to nearly perfectly match the deep, dark red colour of the leather on the cover. The paint was then painted onto a thinner strip of Japanese paper, effectively tinting the paper to the colour of the leather cover. The strip of paper was then hung on the edge of a table to dry completely. 

Once the spine was dry, we pasted a piece of acid-free cardboard to the spine, forming the new spine board and then wrapped the book, while still in a bookbinder's vice, with bandages and left it once again to dry. We repeated the process with the leather spine, but instead of wheat starch glue, we used a mixture of PVA, an archival-quality wood glue, and wheat starch paste. We used this mixture because it would not affect the text block and would create a more durable bond so the spine could be safely handled. The patient was then wrapped in bandages once again and left to dry overnight.

The next day, with the spine and boards expertly re-attached and the surgery successfully completed, we used the tinted Japanese paper to cover some of the larger damages which distracted from the beauty of the book. We tore up strips and small pieces of the paper and pasted them onto the damaged leather using Klucel G adhesive. This not only hid the damages but also protected the leather and cover boards from further damage.

After this lengthy, slightly challenging, but privileged learning experience with the ultimate book surgeon, Emma Fraser, the surgery was complete and our silent patient could be successfully released.