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• Nationwide Initiative Secures $47 Million in Digital Content for the Humanities and Social Sciences
• Decorative Book Arts Display
• The Library Celebrates Long-Service Staff
• Changes to the Historical Abstracts and America: History and Life Databases
• Looking for the "Article Finder"?
• Porter's Main Floor Now Closed
• Welcome to Sara Perkins
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Decorative Books Arts Display

Looking for something brainy that is also beautiful? Next time you’re in Porter, stop by Special Collections to take a look at the department’s Decorative Book Arts Display, running until the end of June.

The display includes a selection of the department’s finest adorned books and showcases a wide range of the decorative book arts. Highlights include:

• Books with fore-edge paintings:

Above: A painting captioned "Alnwick Castle" revealed on this 1827 edition of W. H. Smyth's "Sketch of the Present State of Sardinia." Described as “one of the most curious” of the book decorative arts, fore-edge painting is a process where a picture is painted on the front (fore) edge of a book so that the painting is most visible when the pages are fanned out. When the pages are flat (the book is closed), the painting is concealed and protected.

• A variety of bindings, including velvet, brocade, morocco, and metal, that exemplify efforts to harmonize form and subject matter:

• Sample bindings from select binders such as Robert Rivière.
  
  
• A book with "gauffered" edges, displaying a technique used to create indented patterns or crimped designs on top of gilding.
  
  
• And much more!

For more information on the display, contact:

Department Head, Special Collections
Ext. 33122

University of Waterloo Library
200 University Avenue West
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3G1
519 888 4883

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