The Lap of Luxury (Binding)

For fine bookbinding fans, it is hard to beat the talented productions of Francis Sangorski and George Sutcliffe. Trained as bookbinders at the renowned Cockerell Bindery, they formed their own eponymous firm in 1901. Sangorski & Sutcliffe are best-remembered for their luxurious jeweled bindings, inlaid with real gold and gems and complicated leather tooling and appliques. These fine bindings were part of a general revival of the art of bookbinding in England around the turn of the 20th century.

Sangorski & Sutcliffe didn't "just" do bookbinding. Francis Sangorski's older brother, Alberto, worked with the firm as an artist and illuminator, creating by hand spectacular one-of-a-kind works inspired by illuminated medieval manuscripts. The Rare Book Department recently uncovered two on our own shelves: the Odes of John Keats and the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Both were commissioned by the Grolier Society (now the famous Grolier Club) in the first years of the 20th century, and donated to the Free Library in 1952. They had been previously accessioned (formally recorded as an addition to our collections) but never cataloged and are just now going to be available to researchers and for exhibition.

Our Rubaiyat, while lovely, is only one of several made by the artisans. The most famous, " The Great Omar" was an opulent edition of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, commissioned with no concern for budget. After more than two years of work, the book was listed for sale in 1911 for £1000 (about $130,000 today) and set sail the following spring for New York and the prominent book dealer Gabriel Wells. Unfortunately, it set sail on the Titanic.

Only a few months after the demise of The Great Omar came the drowning death of Francis Sangorski. After Sangorski's death, a second Great Omar was created , following the original specifications, and housed in a bank vault for safekeeping. That bank vault, and the second Great Omar, was destroyed in a bombing during World War II. The firm continued on, and in 1989 after decades of on-and-off labor, a third Great Omar was produced. As yet, it endures, having been donated to the British Library in 2005. Hopefully their flood and fire suppression systems are in good working order.