Our book covers are made with heavy acid-free binder board and covered with either archival buckram or leather. The gold stamping on the cover and spine is created by hand, which results in a deeper and longer-lasting finish. This method also allows for type-size changes to give your work a more customized appearance.
Often we hear from students across the country that they have difficulty in finding library binders. Once they locate a binder, the options are limited, and the delivery time is three to four weeks. Copy shops that offer a library binding service will most likely send the work to a vendor in another state. This also results in slow delivery and delayed responses when dealing with errors.
At a time when most newly minted texts exist only as 1s and 0s on a computer somewhere, it sometimes pays to be old fashioned. George and Judie Shattuck, owners of Smith-Shattuck Bookbinding, have nurtured a business that defies the evanescence of electronic words with a tangible product crafted by hand in their studio at 759 State Road in Princeton Township.
“When you walk into the shop, this is a place of permanence,” says Judie. “You’re feeling a book in your hand, holding it and knowing it’s going to last. That’s one thing we enjoy so much, that the work we do is going to last; it can’t be wiped away with the flick of a button.”
The Shattucks purchased their business in 1983 from Earl Smith, who had established it in 1952.
(Excerpted from “In the Age of Kindle, a Bookbinder Thrives” by Michele Alperin, from the January 26, 2011 issue of U.S. 1 Newspaper)