BOOK ARTS LINKS

last update: 12/30/17 (sharpening stones, files).

These are just links I happened to accumulate. I have made no attempt at completeness in any area. With regard to suppliers, expecially, no endorsement is implied by the presence of a link here. I’ve done no more than look at many of these sites. I haven’t knowingly including links to anything dubious or not worthwhile. Corrections, updates, suggestions, and notices of dead links are welcome.

MINNESOTA & UPPER MIDWEST

Organizations   People & Studios/Shops   Supplies

GENERAL BOOK ARTS   

LETTERPRESS & TYPE

Organizations & Institutions    Informational Sites    Printing Shops & People

Metal Type Foundries    Supplies

DIGITAL TYPOGRAPHY

BOOKBINDING, CONSERVATION, PAPER

Organizations & Institutions    Informational Sites    Bookbinders    Supplies

WOODWORKING, METAL & MISC. FABRICATION, SPECIALTY TOOLS

Organizations & Information     General & Misc. Tools

Woodworking Tools     Cutting Tools, Sharpening

Files, Rasps, Material Shaping    Materials

Leatherwork (other than bookbinding)     Tool Storage

ORGANIZATIONS & INSTITUTIONS

PEOPLE & STUDIOS / SHOPS

SUPPLIES

ORGANIZATIONS & INSTITUTIONS

INFORMATIONAL SITES

Philobiblion / Book Arts Web. Bookbinding, papermaking, etc. LOTS of links.

Museum of Forgotten Art Supplies

INDUSTRIAL GRAPHIC ARTS

ORGANIZATIONS

The American Printing History Association “a membership organization that encourages the study of the history of printing and related arts and crafts, including calligraphy, typefounding, typography, papermaking, bookbinding, illustration, and publishing.”

Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum 1.5 Million Pieces of Wood Type.

Bowne & Co. Museum

C.C. Stern Type Foundry: The Museum of Metal Typography

The Museum of Printing North Andover, Massachusetts

The International Printing Museum (Carson, CA, Los Angeles area.)


British Letterpress “A UK-centric view of letterpress printing.”

Let­ter­press Alive

Metal Type UK Includes the The Whittaker Linecaster Collection

The Type Archive (UK) Holds typefounding materials from major British foundries, and from Monotype.


Association of European Printing Museums

Tipoteca Italiana (Treviso)

Familia Plómez Letterpress organization, Madrid, Spain.
 

INFORMATIONAL SITES

Briar Press A letterpress community.

Letterpress Commons Sharing letterpress printing knowledge.

Paul Moxon: Vandercook Proof Press Information

Paul Moxon, Fameorshame.com Includes many links.

The Alembic Press. Lots of information, including:
    Comprehensive page on typecase lays.
    U.S. Monotype faces list page
    British Monotype series numbers page

Circuitous Root Lots of information, including:
    type collections.
    Foundries: historic.
    List of All Type Specimen and Matrix Information on CircuitousRoot.

Wood Type Research: David Shields.

The Type Heritage Project.
    “The original mission of The Type Heritage Project [THP] was to discover and document, in a series of scholarly textbooks, the sources of existing digital display fonts originally designed between c1800 and World War I. ... Everyone interested in research and/or revivals of pre-digital types is cordially invited to view discussions and attachments.”
    forums (“The Chapel”) of The Type Heritage Project. “This Chapel is a ‘virtual hangout’ that connects revival developers and researchers with THP, with each other, and with like-minded folks.”

British Letterpress “A UK-centric view of letterpress printing.”

Metal Type (UK). Note the Library page, with many PDFs, including much information on casting machinery, including downloadable manufacturer documentation.

Luc Devroye. Lots of information about type.

Typefoundry: Documents for the History of Type And Letterforms.

Monotype casting information

Linotype: The Film

PRINTING SHOPS & PEOPLE

METAL TYPE FOUNDRIES
(plus some wood type & other sources for type)

SUPPLIES

Books

General Supplies

Just a few miscellaneous links I happen to have.

FOUNDRIES AND DEALERS

Digital Type Foundries list David Airey, graphic designer

FONT-CREATION SOFTWARE & RELATED TECHNICAL INFORMATION

Languages in type:

INFORMATIONAL SITES

ORGANIZATIONS

INFORMATIONAL SITES

BOOKBINDERS

SUPPLIES

Books

General & Misc. Supplies (see also Tools, below)

Tools (see also General & Misc. Supplies, above, and Leather Tooling, below)

Paper

Leather (see also General & Misc. Supplies)

Hot Stamping & Leather Tooling (see also General & Misc. Supplies)

ORGANIZATIONS

INFORMATION

Woodworking Tools & Techniques: General Information

SUPPLIES: TOOLS, MATERIALS, ETC.

General & Misc. Tools

Ax-Man Surplus.

Wright County Swappers Meet

Grainger. General industrial tools and supplies. Quality stuff for professionals; not cheap. Stores everywhere, Minnesota and nationwide; if item not in stock, order to pick up in store.

Woodcraft Quality woodworking supplies. A national chain with a store in Bloomington (9125 Lyndale Avenue South).

Veberod Gem Gallery Jewelry-making supplies & tools. Some tools are of interest for book arts and small metalworking projects. Good cheap pin vises. (Minnetonka, across 61 from Ridgedale.)

Rockler. Good stuff for enthusiasts with money; some available for less elsewhere (e.g., Woodcraft). A Minnesota company, with local stores.

Jo-Ann Fabrics. Lots of neat small tools in several departments, some for working with paper as well as sewing, beading, and similar crafts. Also, of course, all sorts of fabrics. Some stores (such as Maple Grove) are bigger and better stocked than others (such as Ridgedale).

rest of the world

McMaster-Carr industrial supplies 500,000 products, no order too small. They also give you lots of information you will need (measurements, specs, etc.) about whatever you are looking at—sometimes more info than you’ll find at the manufacturer’s site.

Klein Tools Well-known maker of general tools.

Snap-on Tools. Famous high-quality tools, especially for mechanics. Priced accordingly. Not everything they sell is made by them, and quality may vary accordingly–even at top prices.

Rio Grande Jewelry-making supplies & tools. Some tools are of interest for book arts and small metalworking projects. Good cheap pin vises.

Otto Frei Jewelry-making tools, findings, and supplies.

Lakeside Scissor Sales Specialized scissors, hobby tools, etc. Quality can vary, but there’s good stuff for little money. They’ve been at the State Fair, may be regulars for all I know.

Micro-Mark: Small hobby tools & miniature tools.

American Science & Surplus: Like the Twin Cities’ Ax-Man. A good place to buy 10x illuminated loupes for much less than the same loupe would cost elsewhere, if you want to read the ATF series numbers stamped on the shoulder below the baselines of the Hs and ms of 6-point type. (The $7 loupe works fine.) Where technical specs matter, they’re knowledgable, informative, and honest.

Hand-Eye Supply “Tools, Books & Clothing for Practical Purposes.” Gaebel pica sticks.

The Best Things: connoisseur tools,

ARTCO American Rotary Tools Company; also hand tools.

engineersupply.com Engineering supplies, measuring tools, etc.

The Rust Store “Solutions for All Rust Problems.”

Woodworking Tools

Cutting Tools, Sharpening

For sharpening and shaping of metal, I’m generally happy with Arkansas stones, diamond sharpeners (in particular those from EZE-Lap, below), and sandpaper, with big cheap carborundum stones for coarse work, files for special shaping, and really big files for the coarsest material removal tasks.

Arkansas stones are no longer the only option for quality sharpening stones, but they still have a lot going for them, including simplicity of use and low maintenance, advantages that some of the newer alternatives do not have. The white and “translucent” Arkansas stones have as fine a grit as you could ask for. I recommend Dan’s, below, as a source for these stones.

Chronic woodworkers are very fond of waterstones. These cut faster (and cooler) than oilstones, and are available in a wide range of grits. But they also wear down faster, and must be periodically flattened. They must be kept soaked in water, which also means that they need their own space. Any metal sharpened with them must be promptly and carefully dried. For this reason, they are practicable mainly for people who do a great deal of sharpening, enough to warrant the extra maintenance and space, and who have workshops with space for a dedicated sharpening station.

Carborundum stones (a.k.a. silicon carbide) are most familiar as cheap items in hardware stores. (Crystolon is Norton’s brand-name for their high-quality silicon-carbide stones, which are not cheap.) They come in several grades of grit; combination stones are also available. As far as I know, the cheap ones, at least, are not available in the finest grits needed for the finest finishes on blades; this is probably because cheap carborundum would not be suitable for this in any case. Look for the big ones (6 inches long or so) unless you need something smaller for touching up small knives.
    Carborundum stones are not natural stones: they are made from ground-up silicon carbide. The cheap ones, which are fine for many purposes (and all I’ve ever owned), are made of coarsely sorted powder and thus have less consistent grit. Higher-quality ones are available, for a significantly higher cost. The best-known high-quality ones are the Crystolon brand from Norton.     Carborundum is extremely hard, harder than any knife blade. It is good for re-beveling and re-shaping, and for harder steels (such as D2 and stainless). The finer grits are a good first step for sharpening dull blades. For a good edge, finish off with a finer stone of another type.
    Carborundum stones need to be lubricated like most other stones, and are classed among the oilstones.
    (“Carborundum,” by the way, is a trade name that long ago came into common use as a generic term.)

Grit sizes can be very confusing, since different systems are used to designate grit size for different sharpening materials (sandpaper, oilstones, waterstones, diamond stones, etc.) Information about grit equivalencies found on the Web is not always accurate or consistent. Christopher Schwarz (who else?) does much to clear this up with a brief article and useful (downloadable) comparison charts, at: https://www.popularwoodworking.com/article/true-grit-understanding-sharpening-grits.

Most sharpening stones need to be lubricated. This keeps them from getting loaded up with fine metal particles, which would soon impair their cutting ability. Lubricant also reduces temperature, which could be an issue with tempered metal, though I don’t know if this is the case at hand-sharpening speeds. Some stones are lubricated with water: waterstones, of course; diamond stones also work best with a few drops of water. The common “wet/dry” sandpapers can also be used with water. Blades sharpened with water must be promptly and thoroughly dried. Ceramic stones are not used with lubrication; they must therefore be cleaned during lengthy sessions and after use.
    Other stones (including Arkansas and Carborundum stones) fall under the general class of “oilstones.” A wide variety of substances is in fact used to lubricate these. Oils for stones are commonly sold by dealers in sharpening supplies. 3-in-1 oil is an old standby. In recent years, however, Simple Green brand all-purpose cleaner has become very popular as a sharpening lubricant for oilstones—it lubricates well and keeps the stone very clean. You should give it a try. It’s also quite good for its intended purpose, which includes getting gunk off machines.

Dan’s Whetstone Co. Arkansas stones, etc. I recommend Dan’s as a source for these stones.

Eze-Lap. A wide variety of well-designed diamond and carbide sharpening tools for many, many uses. A number are small, very handy, and quite affordable. I love their Model M and model S pocket sharpeners for on-the-go touch-ups.

Flitz Premium Polishing Products. Abrasive goo to put on your strop.

Shor International Jewelry polishing compounds.

SharpeningSupplies.com Strops.

Honing Guides by Richard Kell.

X-ACTO Craft & Office Tools; Knives, Sharpeners, Trimmers.

Japanese wood working tool shop. Knives.

Japanese marking knife.

Files, Rasps, Material Shaping

File handles are a matter that deserves the attention of readers of this page. If you use a file without a handle, you run the risk of injuring yourself on the file tang if you slip. If you slip with enough force, the injury could be serious. Serious woodworkers are apt to make their own handles, which is easy enough if you have even a rudimentary wood shop. This is perhaps why the matter isn’t much discussed.
    But for those of us who must buy them, note that file handles are always much too small for the file sizes (lengths) they’re rated for. Almost all of the tang should be covered by the handle. Measure the maximum tang thickness and the size of the hole in the handle, and buy accordingly. I’ve never found ready-made handles that fit well on really big files, so for these just buy the biggest handle you can.
    The Lutz “Skrooz-On” handles (below) are the handiest I’ve found. Pferd, a European maker of files, also makes good handles of another type, which can be bought—by the box only—from Grainger. A lot of the handles I’ve gotten in hardware stores (including Nicholson brand) are not so good.

Future Home of Slav’s Tool Shop. Little on the site right now, not even contact information, and this hasn’t changed in some time. Slav is a woodworker and a legendary dealer of new old stock (NOS) files and rasps. I think he mainly sells at shows, and to addicts who have his phone number. Some of his stock is very old indeed, and none the worse for that. Slav’s prices are quite reasonable for the value he gives in merchandise quality, selection, and product knowledge. I’ve had the memorable pleasure of buying some files from him at a toolfest. I can put you in touch with him; you can also just do a Web search for the two words    Slav    file    —which is a measure of how synonymous those words are among file afficionados.

Maine Wood Concepts Current maker of Lutz “Skrooz-On” file handles, famous old shop standards with much to recommend them, including price. The best source is Maine Wood or McMaster Carr; the latter may have more informative lists and about as wide a selection. Other sources may not sell the full range.

Boggs Tool & File Sharpening Company. They sharpen old files—I have no idea how. I’ve seen the results, which are definitely good.

Grobet USA Mfrs & Distributors: fine (& famous) Swiss files, etc.

Gold Precision Rasps—Corradi Shop High quality files and rasps.

Milani Handcut Rasps.

Willy Vanhoutte. Renzo Milani hand cut rasps.

ICS Cutting Tools: files page.

Materials

Leatherwork (other than bookbinding)

Tool Storage