As many will know, fish skin for bookbinding, whether as parchment and tanned has long been an area of interest for me. This interest was sparked by several articles on the subject by Ernst Collin and others largely during Germany's Weimar era. The 2020 Fish Skin Bind-O-Rama was a sort of culmination of my efforts to bring attention to this material, but more so I am very pleased to see binders and book artists still working in the material, in particular Karen Hanmer and Debra Frances.
Some time ago I was given a package of Icelandic cod doggie chew snacks by a friend. Those chews looked gnarly and I wondered if they could be processed into parchment or leather, you know, as an experiment and proof of concept.
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| Dentley's "Exotics" Icelandic Cod Skins |
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| These things are big at 18 inches, so I needed some help holding them upright. Note how they are folded/rolled up. |
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| The third skin in the pack. Keeping this "as is" as a sample and control. Side "A" |
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| Side "B" |
So, as one can see, they're big and folded/rolled up lengthwise. Also rock-hard and in need of serious cleaning and scaling.
First step was to [re]hydrate so I could unfold ... and get them into a quart-sized Mason jar. Plugged the kitchen sink and into the first bath of COLD water with isopropyl and strong dish detergent. Surprisingly, that worked so that after about an hour they could be pulled flat and pushed into the jar.
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| Soaking in isopropyl, dish detergent, and COLD water. This went into the fridge with several changes of water and dish detergent, accompanied by massaging to help loosen the fibers, and starting to scrape away flesh, fat, and other stuff. Lots to do there ... |
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| Next was descaling. "Shinies" EVERYWHERE in the kitchen. "Shinies" was coined by one of the youngest fish skin binders. In the end I didn't do as good a job as I thought. 🙄 |
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| Finally, the skins were stretched out to dry. |
Evident on the lower one are parallel lines from something between being caught and dried for packaging. Both skins also have areas where the skin was chewed up. This makes for very gnarly look. I may well use the top one. Would be a shame not to after all that work.
As I was going through all this I googled for these fishy dog chews. Cod and haddock seem most common, with both available in different sizes and shapes, e.g. dainty rolls for that favorite "tea cup" dog. The steps are essentially the same as with fresh caught fish, but this is much easier to store. Maybe these could be good for more basic workshops where skinning a fish, or cleaning a fresh skin is to messy and gross in the eyes of the participants. Simply soak and rehydrate first, then let they have fun scaping and stretching out or tanning.
Though he said he was sick of this fishy business, Fritz Otto snuck off and processed his own cod too ... Probably won't use it, but makes a splendid Dekoobjekt / objet décoratif.
