Of Perfect Bible Leathers and Corners

Well, things have changed again in the leather department.

Unfortunately, the beautiful colors of top-grain cowhide will now not be available, as the distributor has decided to discontinue them. We have only the in-stock colors of sky blue and mocha, until they run out. No one saw this coming, and these hides made great Bibles, but we must move on to other hunting grounds.

Leather supply for Bible rebinding is a moving target sometimes. There are very few places that supply leather for Bible binding anyway, and finding leather suitable for rebinding is an endless search. It has to do with having different needs than other industries, such as Bible publishing or upholstery, and a comparatively smaller market.

Most large Bible publishing houses with corner crimping machines need thin, flexible top grain leather or bonded leather in rolls, because that will fit in their machines and reduce waste. And bookbinders who mostly rebind hardcover books also like the thinner leathers; they fold easier.

But leather for Bible rebinding shouldn't be too thin. Our customers are already frustrated with bonded leather and the way it dissolves with use. And they mistakenly thought the genuine leather on their Bibles would last forever, only to find out it was the thin version (weight: 1 oz.) that would develop worn spots or even tears along the edges in just a few months. Some of our customers also have had problems with Bibles that were constructed with the edges of the corner crimping showing over the lining material. The sharp edges of the corners catch the pages of the Bible and tear them up. Here's a familiar picture of a factory-produced, crimped corner:

At Leonard's, we don't need to use the very thin top-grain pigskin because we don't use corner crimping machines. We also don't skive (pare) the leather down on a Bible so it can be folded. Instead, our corners are skillfully constructed so that they fold down gracefully over the corners without adding too much bulk. This keeps the corners durable but smooth, with nothing to catch on.

The furniture upholstery industry, by contrast, needs leather that is sturdy, but flexibility doesn't seem all that important. In fact, we see some thinner leathers made especially for the upholstery industry that have been backed with another material to add durability.

This is unacceptable to us -- the last thing we need is for extra added stiffness in a leather, just so it will last longer. Our customers want to be able to open their Bibles -- and to have them stay open.

So, our "perfect leather" would be in the range of 1.75 - 2.5 oz., but also good and flexible. Some of our leathers are somewhat less flexible but those make great covers for the very heavy study Bibles that need support for the weight. Perfect leather is not easy to find, but we will continue to seek it out. Our customers deserve it.

We still have plenty of really great burgundy sculptured Italian cowhide. The texture is primo! And for soft and flexible in a traditional black, we still love the glazed black pebble grain deerskin.

Blessings,
Eric

Leonard's Book Restoration Station
www.LeonardsBooks.com
Skilled bookbinding, restoration and repair services
P.O. Box 52***Burrows, IN 46916**U.S.A.
Phone: (574) 652-2151

New Leathers In -- Old Leathers Out

Hi!

It's been awhile since we've posted anything, but things are good here in Indiana -- no earthquakes or tsunamis, no record snowfalls, just a good blanket of snow that waters the fertile soil for the winter wheat crop.

And yes, we've gotten over the Christmas rush, but we still have plenty to do. Our theory is, every book or Bible that we do right is our best advertisement. And the Lord has blessed that approach.The news is, I've gotta get the website changed soon. We have several leathers not available anymore and other new leathers that you might want to hear about. Until I get the website changed, here's the scoop.

Not available anymore: bomber jacket lambskin. I know, that's all over the place. It was nice while it lasted. Another leather, aviator sheepskin, is just not meeting our standards. We are also not going to be able to get several of the pigskins anymore: notably, the teal, plum, and deep burgundy.

But here are some new things that we believe you'll really like::-)The first is a top-grain cowhide. I know, in other posts, we've mentioned that top-grain cowhide is the uppermost portion of a piece of older leather, and that we prefer using a full-grain younger leather. But these cowhides look very nice indeed. Each has a pleasant light pebble grain, is soft and supple, and should be good and long-lasting. The best part is they come in 25 different colors. No, not black or burgundy, but 25 other colors like peacock, ivy, mocha, bright red, yellow, and purple. We like the combination of the thickness (durability) and the softness (flexibility).


The second is that we have some good flexible calfskins in several more colors now. We have them in a thicker black, brown, navy, burgundy, and forest green. These have the same nice grain I called "rustic" on the website. (Someone asked me what "rustic" meant recently. The answer -- it's not slick-smooth!) These calfskins look and feel wonderful on a Bible. The grain is mostly a small pebbly grain.


One more bovine option: burgundy sculptured Italian calfskin. It only comes in burgundy, looks "pre-wrinkled" and is wonderfully thick and flexible. I know, we were just teasing about the nationality of leathers in our last post, but then this stuff came in, and it really is nice. (The picture looks lighter than it really is, but shows the texture.)


Now, about the deerskin. We have done lots of really nice deerskin Bibles lately. They are very soft and flexible, and many people are looking for that feel nowadays. But there's a color you may have seen, both on our website and on other sites, called "natural tan" that's really not what it seems to be. The pictures of "natural tan" are actually a leather that's been hand-dyed to a glossy medium brown. Natural unfinished deerskin has more of a matte finish and could be even an eggshell color. So if you like the pictures, you would want to order "natural grain deerskin, hand-dyed to a glossy medium brown finish."


We also have burgundy, brown, and gold, that we can leave as is if you like, without that hand-dyed glossy finish. Here's a pic of some natural brown deerskin Bibles:

That's the scoop for now. We'll try to post more often.

Blessings in Jesus,
Margie

www.LeonardsBooks.com
Skilled bookbinding, restoration and repair services
P.O. Box 52***Burrows, IN 46916**U.S.A.
Phone: (574) 652-2151

Bible Leather Lingo and Its Evolution -- A Call for Honesty

A pet peeve of mine has always been intentional misrepresentation and misnomer. The old classic examples are the word "official" on a kid's baseball mitt, "limited edition" on something that has no defined limit, and "authentic" without any qualifiers.

Every field of marketing surely has its own Orwellian New Speak. In the furniture world, a piece of wooden furniture may be called "vintage walnut," "classic walnut," "walnut finish," "walnut grain," ... all of which probably mean one thing: the piece is not solid walnut.

New Speak also exists in the world of Bible manufacturing. I'm not referring to the text, though I'm sure examples could be given. I'm thinking more of the Bible covers, which is my field of craftsmanship. We commonly receive Bibles marked "Genuine ... (whatever)." I sometimes wish Bible manufacturers would just print the word "Genuine" and leave it at that.

Here are my favorites.

Genuine Bonded Leather .. sort of like saying "Genuine Particle Board." Bonded leather is a great binding for Bibles that are seldom used. It's known for disintegrating with frequent contact with human beings.

Italian Calf ... What makes it Italian? Does anybody know? Just asking.

Spanish Bonded Leather ... ???

Top Grain ... Sounds like it's the best, but it's actually considered second best when compared to "full grain." The best leathers are those that have not been skived or split, but are the full hide. "Top Grain" means that you are getting the top side of a split hide. The best hides for binding are those that are from younger and therefore smaller animals, providing a naturally thin hide. Top grain cowhide is nice enough, but you can't even necessarily assume that the words "Top Grain" on your Bible assure that it's cowhide. It only means that whatever leather they used, it was the top side of the split. At Leonard's we use calfskin rather than cowhide. (Younger vs. older.)

Genuine Berkshire... Come on -- it's pigskin. There's nothing wrong with pigskin, if you can just call it what it is. There are more than seventy hog varieties in the world. But has anyone ever heard of a Bible bound in "Chester White," a breed so popular that it has its own journal? While there are a few examples of Berkshire bindings actually being calfskin, most are pigskin, dignified with a classy British sounding name. In fact, if your Bible says "Genuine Leather" and nothing else, it's most likely pigskin. Just look under the grain closely. Do you see little tiny pores like on your own skin? If you do, you have a pigskin binding. By the way, pigskin is a very durable leather and inexpensive here in the U.S. Though there might be a few theological issues for some, we highly recommend it for its durability.

Genuine Morocco ... Last I checked, Morocco was a country, not a leather. But a few hundred years ago, someone rubbed some goatskin on a rock or a board and came up with a unique, bumpy grain. This became a preferred binding leather and was known as Morocco goatskin, presumably because it happened in Morocco. Somewhere along the line the word "goatskin" became unnecessary to describe goatskin. All that was necessary was to say, "My Bible is Morocco Bound." (Sounds like Bob Hope and Bing Crosby -- "Like Webster's Dictionary, we're Morocco-bound.")




French Morocco ... Also a country. Actually, it was someone's idea of a new kind of Morocco. And, no, it wasn't made from French goats. It was sheepskin.

Finally we come to the current state of this misnomer. A major Bible manufacturer lets on that their "French Morocco" is made of thin cowhide. I give them credit in that they at least told us what it was made of. There's nothing at all wrong with a cowhide Bible, ... just tell it like it is. However the Bible in question is not Morocco in any sense of the word. It doesn't even have a morocco grain. It looks like what is commonly called "mission grain."

To press this issue a little further, let me use buffalo wings as an illustration. Now everyone knows what buffalo wings are and are not. We know that buffalos don't fly any more than swine do. Buffalo is a misnomer for hot, and is used in conjunction with wings as in chicken wings. Twenty years ago, a person may have looked at you rather oddly if you offered them a plate of buffalo wings; today we don't bat an eye, but eat them with every expectation of tasting spicy chicken.

But what if you bit into what you thought was chicken and tasted pork? What if you took your concern to the cook and were told that, "Our buffalo wings are made from pork"? Hmmm. Maybe pigs do fly.

I really don't mean to sound judgmental. We probably have our own misnomers that folks could pick at. We advertise an Outback Bible made of genuine kangaroo from Australia. It is indeed from Australia but we really have no proof that the unfortunate creature was from the Outback region of Australia. It could very well have been bagged in Sidney. But we do our best not to misrepresent our product. It may be common practice in a fallen world, but for some reason we feel that those in the business of selling Bibles and Bible covers should be held to a higher standard. What do you think?

--Eric J. Haley

www.LeonardsBooks.com
Skilled bookbinding, restoration and repair services
P.O. Box 52***Burrows, IN 46916**U.S.A.
Phone: (574) 652-2151