Tag Archive: 0decorated papers

The following post was originally written for Engelsberg Ideas. In his autobiography, Dichtung und Wahrheit, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe reminisced about his childhood in Frankfurt: ‘since the earliest times, buyers and sellers had thronged around the Bartholomäuskirche… The stalls of the so-called Pfarreisen were very important to us children and we would come along with fistfuls of money to buy […]

There’s always a danger in book history when you suggest you may have found the first instance of something, but I wonder: could this be the first blank bookplate, i.e. ones that are pre-printed with ‘This book belongs to …’ that you then fill in yourself with your name? These block-printed covers were produced in […]

With apologies for cross-posting. It has long been recognised that the term ‘Dutch gilt paper’ (for brocade paper/Brokatpapier/papier doré/carta dorata) is a misnomer: such papers were almost exclusively made in southern Germany and northern Italy.  In the past, it has been suggested that the name comes from the fact that they were either imported from […]

As some of you have already gleaned from social media, we have been actively indulging our love of brocade paper with the hashtag #giltypleasures and encouraging others to do the same…