Guidelines for Book Care

Often times at Restoration Books we are not repairing damage to books caused by everyday wear and tear, but rather old repairs done by unskilled hands that have injured their books far more than they could have realized.  If your book is valuable it is best to take it to a specialist in book conservation before trying to clean or fix it yourself.  In the meantime here are a few guidelines of materials to avoid when repairing your books, and how to take care of your books.  

If you want to glue in a page or part of the cover of your book, it is best to use PVA glue, which can be purchased at a craft store.

Materials to Avoid:
Duct Tape
Scotch Tape
Masking Tape
Elmer's Glue
Rubber Cement
Hot Glue

Tips on how to take care of your valuable books:
Never store leather in a plastic bag.  You can find archival plastic bags that won't ruin your valuable book, otherwise don't use plastic bags.
Don't use books as a coasters.
Don't store books on the foredge or spine.
Don't store books on an angle.
Don't pack your book shelves too tight.
Don't pull books off a shelf by the head cap.
Don't treat leather books with leather conditioners meant for shoes, saddles, etc.
It's never a good idea to lend out your valuable books.

Here are few pictures of books we've restored.

For questions give us a call or send us an email

435-757-4988

info@rarebookrestoration.com 

New portfolio shots of some of our most recent work

Here are a few representative shots of some of our recent work we've done around the bindery.  Next to our restoration and conservation work, the vast majority of the items that we are commissioned to produce are limited leather-bound editions for collectors, authors, and publishers.  We can produce one-of-a-kind leather bindings for a single book to hundreds of books.  We work with each customer to develop the finished design in diverse period styles.  If you have any questions about our custom binding options, please feel free to contact us for more information.

An example of some of our edition work. This particular limited leather edition was completed for a local publisher in an edition of 10 copies accompanied by a matching full leather clamshell box.

Two identical volumes of the "Life and Travels of Parley P. Pratt." Both of these copies were in heavily worn original cloth covers. We reproduced custom stamping dies to match the original full-leather designs and stamped them to match. We have the ability to re-create nearly any cover design from scratch. The finished results are so close to the original publishers binding, that it's nearly impossible to tell the two apart.

A custom full leather clamshell enclosure for which we had custom stamping dies created to match the motif on the covers of the original book.

A very large oversized full-leather post binding for a collection of encapsulated documents and photographs for a prominent early Utah family. We also created a matching oversized full-leather clamshell enclosure to protect the binding when not on display.

We also specialize in study bible & scripture rebinding. This is a set of LDS scriptures that a customer had us rebind in full brown morocco goatskin. We dressed up the spine a bit, with a little more gold stamping than regularly appears on the standard issue LDS scriptures. We can bind your study bible/scriptures to look however you would like them to appear.

Welcome to the new Restoration Books blog!

We're happy to announce the launch of our newly designed website www.RareBookRestoration.com!  In conjunction with the release of our new website design, we're also launching a new blog where we hope to keep our friend and clients updated on the daily happenings around the shop.  Thanks for taking the time to visit our new site and blog.  Please let us know if you have any suggestions for improvement as we're always looking for ways to be better.  Thank you for your continued support as we expand and grow.  We have the best customers anyone could ask for!

Summer issue of "Fine Books & Collections" magazine has arrived!

The latest issue of "Fine Books & Collections" magazine just arrived in the mail. Our new quarter page ad appears in the 'marketplace' section in the rear. If you don't already subscribe, be sure to pick up this issue from your favorite Fine Books retailer near you! This promises to be a wonderful issue...enjoy!

Rare Books, Book Collection, Manuscripts and Old Maps - Fine Books & Collections

www.finebooksmagazine.com

Fine Books & Collections is the internet's leading destination for news and information on collecting rare books, maps, manuscripts, prints, graphic arts, fine press editions, and more.