Spring Newsletter 2019

Contents
Rocky Mountain Chapter News -
including information on elections of
new RMC officers
page 2
RMC Workshops and Events

page 3
Upcoming Workshops and Classes

page 4

Upcoming Exhibition and Call for

Submissions

page 5
Interview with Lang Ingalls
page 6


Dear Rocky Mountain Chapter Members,

It’s time to elect new RMC officers! See page 2 for
details. Consider nominating yourself or someone
else - let Karen Jones know by May 8.
There have been a lot of RMC workshops this spring,
so check out the articles and pictures on pages 3-4.

The Denver RMC/GBW summer gathering is

tentatively scheduled for the afternoon of Sunday,
June 30 at Dayton Memorial. Details coming.
This issue also includes a great interview with GBW
Newsletter Editor Lang Ingalls, starting on page 6.
This is my last newsletter as Communications
Director. It has been a pleasure providing you
information and interviews. I look forward to staying
active in RMC. I wish you all wellness and peace. Kaylin Lee style “magic” box, made by Karen Jones,
Pamela Leutz photographed on Ray Tamasso handmade paper


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 RMC News

Time for RMC ELECTIONS!


Hello RMC/GBW members!
This year we have more board positions open as several long-serving members are stepping down.
Understanding how stretched all of us are for time and funds, we're offering an incentive for the new term,
which is two years. Each elected Officer is eligible to collect a $100 award per term. The award can be used
toward registration for GBW Standards or chapter workshop registration only. An Officer may choose not to
accept or to gift the award to another Officer at will.

Please consider running. Nominate yourself or suggest names of other members that may be interested. A ballot
will be sent to the membership mid-May and new chapter officers announced in June. Please respond by May 8.

We are also willing to provide registration for Standards to a member who is web savvy and is willing to spend
time expanding our online presence and help develop digital marketing mailing lists, etc. If you are interested,
please contact me directly. These funds are also available to the Communications Director nominee if that person
has the expertise.

We're happy to answer any questions on how this all works and share the current chapter guidelines. It's
important that the Board change on a regular basis, so no one feels locked into volunteering indefinitely, all
members are welcomed and served, and the chapter stays vital!

The positions available are:

Treasurer
- Creates an annual chapter budget with Chairs
- Oversees all financial activities (workshops, etc.)
- Records all financial transactions
- Collects, approves, and forwards all bills for payment
The national treasurer for GBW takes care of any filing duties so there is no interaction with the IRS. Everything
required can be done via email. Workload: 1 hr. per month

Communications Director
- Creates and/or monitors web site information, posts newsletter online. May maintain a blog or other
social media for the chapter
- Edits quarterly chapter newsletter content and production
Workload: about 3-4 hrs. per month, but varies depending on tasks

Co-chair: (1 position open. Two are currently on the Board)*

- Responsible for the smooth and effective running of the chapter
- Communicates with the chapter membership
- Represents the chapter at the meetings of the GBW Board of Directors including:
Quarterly conference call meetings
Board of Directors annual meeting at the Standards Conference
Chapter Chairs annual meeting at the Standards Conference
(is reimbursed for hotel at Standards to attend these meetings)
- Keeps chapter membership lists (names, phone, email) which are available on the GBW site.
- Collects permanent records and materials for the GBW Archives. (can be in digital format)
Workload: about 3-4 hrs. per month

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Workshop Coordinator (1 position open. Two are currently on the Board)*
- Researches and communicates with prospective presenters, and/or chapter member workshop hosts, keeps
board informed about possibilities. Schedules workshops at times agreed upon by chapter and presenters.
- Creates proposal to Board, and budget that includes travel and a per diem amount for room and board.
Once approved, communicates with presenter; then collects information to produce a promotional piece that is
used by GBW national to create a registration form.
- Monitors registration, informs Chair of need for additional promotion, creates email list of students.
- Sends a contract and W-9 to presenter, coordinates local arrangements: logistics for presenter and
workshop, tools and materials.
- Creates and distributes evaluation for workshop and summarizes results for Chapter and presenter.
- Insures that workshop expenses comes in within budget and requests invoice from presenter and submit
to Chapter Treasurer for payment.

All of these steps come with templates that could live on google docs.
Workload: about 3-4 hrs. per month, but varies. We usually host 2-3 workshops a year, so workload concentrated
around events rather than spread evenly throughout the year.

* Historically this position has been filled by a member from Colorado or Utah, but all members are eligible for
nomination.
Karen Jones, Co-chair
karen.jones@jeffcolibrary.org

Recent Denver RMC workshops:

On February 24, 2019, the Rocky Mountain Chapter of the GBW sponsored a class
on Embossing and Debossing taught by Kim Hetherington. Your Bindery
generously donated their workspace and provided lunch.

We had a great time learning the various techniques of embossing and debossing
using different kinds of paper, book cloth, and leather. Kim did a fantastic job
leading us through the various techniques she has learned throughout her
bookbinding career. It was also obvious that she spent a lot of time prepping for
the class since everything was so organized. It was interesting to work with such a
variety of materials. The paper included Cave paper, which I was a little
apprehensive with at first, since initially it seemed rather stiff; however, it worked
beautifully. The book cloth included backcloth Kim had made, which led to a
valuable discussion on making your own book cloth. The leather was my favorite
to work with. Kim also discussed the different tools she used and the affects each one had on the finished
product.

As usual during these classes, there was a wealth of information flowing around from the previously
mentioned how to make your own book cloth to how to get an image laser cut. I have always learned way
more than what the class offered just by networking with the other bookbinders during class or during
lunch. I can’t wait for the next class. 

Richard Pollock-Nelson

Inlays and Onlays Workshop with Lang Ingalls, March 24

I really enjoyed Lang’s class on inlay and onlay designs. I feel like, after the class, I can immediately use
what I learned to design and decorate leather covers in my own studio. Lang was very well organized,
provided prepared materials and instructions that almost guaranteed we would be successful, and taught

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in a clear way, demonstrating manageable steps before we returned to our workspaces to execute the same
steps.

After introductions, Lang showed us a bunch of sample plaquettes so we could see how what we would
learn in her workshop could be used for design possibilities – sanded leather, manipulated leather, unusual
skins, inlay materials like stone, tooling, and combinations of these. Some inlays were flat, some recessed
and some raised.

Next she passed out packets to each of us that contained everything we would need for our own
plaquettes, including a lot of colorful pieces of leather, thinned to the perfect thickness for inlays and
onlays; acetate; a prepared plaquette covered in calf skin; partially prepared board for another plaquette
and calfskin for us to cover; and hand-outs that included patterns for the designs we would do in the
workshop.

Lang walked us through cutting acetate patterns, and cutting matching onlay and inlay leather pieces, and
demonstrated the techniques for a variety of onlay styles, including feathered leather, and inlay styles that
also included recessed and raised designs. We also used our new skills to design and make two and three-
color onlays and inlays, and some of us had time to try overlapping designs.

It was great. Lang even showed us how we can use our “flaws” to create new “design opportunities”. I
can attest to that being an essential part of bookbinding!
Pamela Leutz

Unique Paste Papers with Madeline Durham, April 13

Madeleine Durham’s original technique paste paper workshop changed my view

of paste papers from adult finger painting to an elegant undulating art.
As she demoed each pattern, you could see her sink into the lines as she
methodically swayed back and forth with her brush. She openly shared her tricks
for creating steady patterns and patiently walked us through any problems that
came up.

This has been one of my favorite workshops because it leaves me wanting more.
Madeleine’s technique can be used to create an infinite number of patterns, and I
can’t wait to try them. 
Nicole Cotten

Upcoming Workshops and Classes

Colorado
Denver
Art Students League of Denver workshops:
Artist Books: Pasted Papers & Cloth with Alicia Bailey, May 11, 11:00-4:00
Long-Stitch Book and Drop Spine with Alicia Bailey, June 4, 11, 5:30-9:00
Artist Books: Pasted Papers & Cloth with Alicia Bailey, July 21, 11:00-4:00
Artist Books: Pasted Papers & Cloth with Alicia Bailey, August 24, 11:00-4:00
For details on all Alicia Bailey classes: http://www.aliciabailey.com/ravenpress/product-category/events/
workshops-events/

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Telluride
American Academy of Bookbinding
3-Piece Cover with Leather Spine — May 6 - 10 with Monique Lallier
New Oriental Binding — May 13 - 17 with Monique Lallier
Fundamentals/Intermediate Fine Leather Binding - June 3-14 with Don Glaister
Gold Tooling - June 17-21 with Don Glaister
Introduction to Bookbinding, Level 2 - July 8-12 with Peter Geraty
Binding Treatment, Cloth and Paper - July 15-19 with Peter Geraty
Binding Treatment, Leather - July 22-26 with Peter Geraty
Paper Conservation, Level 1 - August 12-16 with Renate Mesmer
Paper Conservation, Level 2 - August 19-23 with Renate Mesmer
Visit bookbindingacademy.org for more information and to register or call Katy at 970-728-8649

Upcoming Exhibit and Call for Submissions

The Art of the Fold


An international exhibition of artists' bookworks created using structures developed by Hedi Kyle and
found in the recent publication https://www.artofthefold.com/ by Hedi Kyle and Ulla Warchol. The
exhibition includes 45 works created by 38 artists, working in Australia, New Zealand, the United
Kingdom and the United States.

Dayton Memorial Library, Regis University, June - August 2019
In conjunction with this exhibit, the RMC/GBW summer gathering is tentatively scheduled for the
afternoon of Sunday, June 30 at Dayton Memorial. More details to come.

Call for submissions


Word | Image | Object 2019



Curated by Abecedarian Artists' Books, the exhibition will be on view July - December 2019 at Denver
Public Library. DPL will be selecting work from the exhibit to add to the Douglas Fine Print Collection.



The submission deadline is May 20 

for full details (http://bit.ly/WIO2019-prospectus)



This exhibition is open to those working in the book form worldwide who are at least 18 years of age.

Eligible are any hand-crafted book works that present a balance of word and image presented in a book or
book-like form. Of particular interest are works in which the content conceptually and functionally
supports the object's structure. Selections will be made by Abecedarian Artists' Books Director Alicia
Bailey, and Denver Public Library Special Collections Librarian Brian Trembath. 

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 Lang Ingalls: Bookbinding, Benevolence and Balance

Tucked behind quaint Townie Books and Rumors Coffee and Tea
House in the heart of Crested Butte is another treasure: Lang
Ingall’s atelier. I walked into a bright space, rich with all things
bookbinding: sewing frames, nipping presses, a beautiful wooden
press and plow, a work bench over paper drawers, hanging linen
threads, samples of sewing structures, loaded bookshelves
everywhere, hand tools, and a collection of binding projects in
process. I wanted lots of time to immerse myself in the pleasure of
the space. Lang showed me around and generously brought out
design bindings she has collected from some of her favorite design
binders. Her excitement about the world of fine design binding was
clear and contagious. She has been an energetic advocate, working
hard to promote bookbinding in a number of ways – teaching, Lang teaching in Denver
volunteering her time as Newsletter Editor for the Guild of Book
Workers national publication, helping found and establish Open
Set, a bookbinding competition and exhibition in the US, and supporting other bookbinders as a
collector. More recently, she agreed to this interview, my final one as I complete my term as
newsletter editor for the RMC, a position that has introduced me to such talented, creative and
warmhearted book workers who never failed to inspire me. I’m honored and grateful to her for
her friendship, support, and presence in our bookbinding community.
…………………………………..

4/4/19 RMC interview with Lang Ingalls:

I’ve read a little about you and the outstanding bookbinders you have studied with and how
they contribute to your “toolbox.” Would you talk about the path you took, what got you
interested in bookbinding, and what led you to begin bookbinding?

I came from a letterpress printing background. I did an apprenticeship in California with the
Yolla Bolly Press under Jim and Carolyn Robinson. They had an apprenticeship program where
you would live on their property and be steeped in letterpress process. As part of my
apprenticeship, I was required to make a small edition of a book. I made this little book and I
only bound two copies because I didn’t know how to bind them. Later, I realized I did it all
wrong! I thought, “I need to learn how to bind, because I have 38 left to do.”

I decided to go to Ascona to study with Edwin Heim, to the Centro del bel libro, a binding and
conservation school in Switzerland. I spent about two months in Ascona the first time and took
lots of classes and got my first real exposure to bookbinding.

After Yolla Bolly and Ascona, I moved to San Francisco and worked at the Arion Press as an
all-around person-who-would-do-anything-she-was-told. I was exposed to a lot more
letterpress stuff, but they also did all their binding in-house, so I got a glimpse of real binding.
Evenings once a week, I started taking classes with Eleanore Ramsey; I thought her work was
really cool. I didn’t realize at the time that Eleanore was the design binder that she was. I just
knew that she taught private classes that fit in my schedule. I got exposed, through her, to fine

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binding. I kept doing my letterpress job four days a week. I took a job one day a week doing
binding at Taurus Bindery, working for Tim James. He’s trained a lot of binders, people you’ve
heard of. I learned a lot there about production – banging stuff out, being efficient, editioning
short cuts.

And I continued classes with Eleanore. The next time I went to Ascona, Cathy Adelman was in
class with me. She told me, “There is a [bookbinding] school right in Colorado.” I said, “I
know about it, but it is a five-year program.” She said, “Look, it seems like five years but it’s
set up the perfect way where there is time in between to do your projects and have a life.
You’ve got to go. I’m going to call and sign you up.” So, she signed me up. It was literally a
month later that I moved back to Colorado and started at AAB, the American Academy of
Bookbinding. My first three years were under Tini Muira – really fun and I found my hands
were good at making books. Then Monique Lallier took over being the director. Things
changed because every teacher has a little bit of a different take on how to teach and how to
get their knowledge through to a student. I readjusted to Monique’s way; her way really speaks
to me! I ended up graduating under her four years later, in 2007. While I was at AAB, I kept
going back to Ascona…because they compliment each other. They don’t teach the same things.
I felt it rounded out what I was learning about bookbinding.

The Island. Geert Mak. Illustrations by Max Kisman.

(The Hague, Netherlands: Stitchting Handboekbinden, 2016.)
Edition of 700 for the International Miniature Bookbinding
Competition 2016/2017
Translation by Liz Waters. 54 x 75 x 13mm

Bound reliure à cru in red goatskin, in miniature. Design elements

include leather endbands and black Strathmore pastedowns and
flyleaves. Untitled & unsigned. Bound in 2017.

The design is developed from the stories of all the different people
moving to The Island (of Amsterdam): a progression on the verso that
marches toward a cluster on the recto.

I had been introduced to a fine binder in Paris who does private lessons in her own atelier, Ana
Ruiz-Larrea. I really hit it off with her and I asked if I might come to learn a structure. Her
request was, “You tell me what structure you want to learn and we’ll figure out a time when we
can do it.” It turned out to be this wonderful thing! I’ve gone back three times, learning
structures that aren’t taught here.

You have had so many different wonderful teachers and opportunities.

Yes, I feel very, very lucky to have sort of tripped into the right things. There wasn’t an
intention for that to happen. I feel like I just got lucky.

But you must have loved it to keep going.

I would say, yes. In another lifetime, when I was much younger, before getting involved in
letterpress printing, I was a ceramic artist. I love working with my hands. I’ve always loved
working with my hands, but in ceramics, I was having the bad luck of losing 20-30% of each
kiln load. That sort of slayed me and made me sad. And because of that, with bookbinding, I

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was always very geared toward, “I’ve made a mistake, how can I fix it?” In bookbinding you
can fix things. I think that I have a mental thing now that you can do anything and you can fix
anything – what are the ways? You just have to open your eyes and look at how you can handle
this problem. Tom Conroy has always said, “Bookbinding is a series of solving problems.”

You have had different teachers who have different styles. Do you think it is important to have a
certain binding style? Do you lean toward one way or do you incorporate all of them?

I would say that I picked up on something that Tini Miura said to me at the very beginning of
when I was learning. She is French trained, hails from Germany and is married to a Japanese
man. “What you do is you learn all the different ways to do something and then you pick that
process which suits you. You pick the technique.” An example is how you make your corners –
you find the corner that you like making and that works for you, and you use that. I think she’s
right. You mentioned my toolbox earlier. Having six different corners that you know how to do
in your toolbox is very helpful because in some leathers you need a certain corner, and in paper
you need something different. I change depending on need, but there is a go-to corner I use for
leather bindings that I learned from Monique.

What is the toolbox?


The toolbox is the metaphor that I use for the knowledge that I have in tool use, materials, and
structure options. When I make a book, the first thing I do is read it, and I decide what kind of
structure would be most appropriate for the book, and that guides me toward all the rest of the
decisions. The "toolbox" is where all of that stuff is, and I pull from it. Mine is constantly
growing. It’s turned into a warehouse.

When I think about you, I think about your promotion of fine design bindings, your efforts to
educate people about them, and your work toward getting more people involved doing fine
bindings and being recognized for them. You’ve worked hard developing the bookbinding
exhibition and competition, Open Set, and you are a collector of design bindings.

Both the collecting and being involved in Open Set, along with teaching, are my way of giving
toward our field as a whole. I think our field is very young in this country; when I visit Europe,
I see that it is very established there. There is a lot of room for our field to grow here, and I
want to contribute to that. My efforts at promoting fine binding—design binding specifically,
but all bookbinding—are to broaden the public’s knowledge of what we actually do.

My atelier is set up kind of like a museum. When people come in and see my sewing frame,
and see my sewing threads braided on the wall, and see my t-squares laying on the deck of the
sewing frame, they are fascinated. I tend to have things out. For example, the different ways
that you sew—when you sew on a cord and pack it—I’ll have a sample book covered in leather
next to it that shows the spine with the actual lines the cord makes. People can understand how
that sewing is related to what those cord-lines are on a spine of a book. I see people’s eyes
widen, and I love that. A lot of people simply don’t know that much about bookbinding. That is
one of my drives: to promote all bookbinding with the public.

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 When I went to your atelier with my friends,
they were so in awe of the design bindings
you showed us. They had never seen
anything like them.

I’ve never had someone come into my shop

and be bored from what I show them. People
are fascinated, but they don’t know about it.
How do we narrow that gap? How do we
educate people? That’s the question that I
ask myself. It’s not even that I’m passionate

Lang’s atelier

about the promotion because it’s hard work. What I’m passionate about is showing people that
our field is there. You don’t know what you don’t know. When people come into my atelier, it
is a really wonderful experience for me. Just seeing people’s eyes widen.

I also think it is important that I find the time to do my own work. For me, as I’ve grown older,
it is the balance of how I expend the energy between my own work and something like teaching
or helping with an exhibition.

Do you want to do more teaching?

I am very happy with what I am teaching right now, students who have never bound a book
before. I would not say that I want to do more—I would say that that is something that will be
told in the future. I already have three commitments to my own classes, and then am assisting
others in a couple of classes. It is already so many weeks of the year, that I feel it begins to
encroach on getting out of balance. I’m not really sure what that would look like to change that,
but I do enjoy the teaching I am doing right now.

Were you instrumental in starting Open Set?




I was. But I don’t think I can take credit for starting it. It was a collaborative effort – it takes a
lot of people. Deb Stevens was my colleague at AAB, and the school sponsors the competition.
We shared the responsibility. We have one national competition in this country, the DeGolyer
[Triennial Exhibition and Competition for American Bookbinding]—which is a fantastic
opportunity for people, but it is a design competition. We thought that doing an actual binding
competition would be great. Deb came up with that name, Open Set. We’re really side-by-side
colleagues on that whole thing.


What is a glimpse into your typical week?

Everything I do tends to focus on bookbinding and the bookbinding world, whether it’s the
balance of my own work, the volunteer things that I do, or teaching. I have no problem coming 

into my atelier in the morning. I get in around 7:30 in morning. I can’t wait to get to work. I

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always go through a few emails in the morning and then get to the bench. That’s my favorite
thing. Sometimes I’m doing design development. Sometimes I’m in my back room just
reading so that I know where to develop my design ideas from. Sometimes, my mom calls and
I talk to her for a half hour...

You asked me earlier how I develop my style. I’m not sure I have one, but if I do, it’s because
there are things that I have identified as interesting to me in terms of design. When I was at
AAB, in order to gain your diploma, they ask you to write a paper. My weakness in
bookbinding is design, and translating what the content of a book is into something on the
cover, what I often call an invitation into the content. So, how do you do that? How do you
take an abstract concept like light and put it on a 2-dimensional surface, where you’re
portraying that it’s light? This fascinates me—it’s intellectually stimulating to me to try to
figure this out. So, I definitely spend time with design. I often will wake up in the night, and
I’ll think about it – for some reason my mind is very open then. I can come up with an initial
concept. The paper I wrote at AAB is called The Seventh Egg. It’s called that because each egg
is your idea. The first egg is your initial idea. I find that if I refine my idea seven or more
times, I have a more successful depiction of what I’m trying to get at. I have this card that sits
right out in front of my desk with ideas that please me, that please my eye. An example of that
is "use of line". I love Ivor Robinson’s work—his use of line stimulates my sense of design. A
woman who is working in line, but in a more broken way, is Tracey Rowledge out of the UK.
Another one is "monochromatic color use". Another is "abstraction". I will never put a sailboat
on the front cover of a book I do. I will abstract the sails that so that the design becomes more
visually interesting. These are things that I’ve identified that are interesting to me. And they
actually drive my style of design.

Do you get out and enjoy the outdoors?



I do. I have enjoyed the great outdoors since I moved to Crested Butte 30 years ago. Now I’m
doing that less as I age—and I bind more—but that has been a very comfortable transition for
me. If I’ve missed skiing or a hike during the day because I’m binding, I’m just fine with that.
But I remain active—it helps me bind better—another balance issue.

Thank you for giving us a glimpse into your life as a bookbinder, Lang. And thank you for your
efforts to educate and promote bookbinding in America.

The Rocky Mountain Chapter blogsite, http://rmcgbw.blogspot.com , includes a member page http://
rmcgbw.blogspot.com/p/members.html and calendar http://rmcgbw.blogspot.com/p/events-
calendar.html ).

I wish you all the best.

Signing Off,
Pamela Train Leutz, Communications Coordinator

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