Name: Cogapp
Price range: $

This exhibition was curated by Elizabeth Quarmby Lawrence, Rare Books and Literary Collections Curator.

With special thanks to the Cultural Heritage Digitisation Service who support learning, teaching, and research through the digitisation of and long-term digital access to rare and unique research collections acquired or created by the University of Edinburgh.

Decorated Paper at the University of Edinburgh

In 2022 the University acquired a collection of over 170 examples of decorated paper from the bookseller and enthusiast Simon Beattie. It includes examples of all techniques other than marbling, which is an enormous subject, dating mostly from the long eighteenth century. Work to catalogue and digitise the collection is in progress and in the meantime lists and information are available by contacting the Centre for Research Collections at is-crc@ed.ac.uk.

The collection is available for use, and has already appeared in classes, student projects, and public engagement events.The plan is to expand it to give wider and more comprehensive coverage, and to document examples of paper already in the collection. Further acquisitions have taken the total in the collection itself to over 180 examples, and preliminary surveys in the existing collections have logged another 50 examples, widely scattered across the Rare Books and Archives collections.

Resources

The Facebook group “We Love Endpapers” is used by librarians and collectors to share examples of decorated papers https://www.facebook.com/groups/WeLoveEndpapers/?mibextid=HsNCOg

Paste Paper, how to make it, from a contemporary Australian bookbinder. This is the first of a series of videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKqvddv9ico

Paste Paper, how to make it, from a contemporary German paper artist. This is the first of a series of blog posts. Bi-lingual English and German throughout: http://www.kurzke.co.uk/paste-paper-i-a-walkthrough/

Diane Maurer-Mathison, The Art of Making Paste Papers, (Wordbound Media, 2020)

How to emboss paper without specialised equipment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4r5H9YUBV5A

P.J.M. Marks An Anthology of Decorated Papers, (London: Thames and Hudson, 2018)

Comprehensive academic reference book: R.J. Wolfe Marbled Paper, its History, Techniques and Patterns, (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1990)

The definitive reference book, but German and out of print: Albert Haemmerle Buntpapier (Munich: Georg D.W. Callwey, 1961), and later editions.

In-depth information about techniques, manufacturers, collections, historical and contemporary http://www.buntpapier.org, but all in German

https://www.herrnhuter-sterne.de/en/Herrnhuter-Kleisterpapier.html Paste paper Christmas stars, still made by the Moravian community at Herrnhut

Schmoller Collection of Decorated Papers at Manchester Metropolitan University: https://www.mmu.ac.uk/special-collections-museum/collections/schmoller-collection-of-decorated-papers

Tanya and Hans Schmoller Paper Chase: an exhibition of decorated papers from the Schmoller Collection held in Edinburgh University Library 1987, (Edinburgh University Library, 1987)

Contemporary Canadian art-papermaker https://www.studiorobertwu.com/marbling#/paste-paper/

Decorated paper on Europeana, the digital images site for European Cultural Heritage https://www.europeana.eu/en/search?page=1&view=grid&query=buntpapier

Simon Beattie's posts about decorated paper in his blog: https://simonbeattie.co.uk/?s=decorated+papers