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| Fritz Otto washes, bleaches, and irons his lab coat every weekend, well almost every weekend. |
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| "Hand painted" decorated paper from the workshop of Emma Gustorff, Beuel a. Rh. (now a part of Bonn). |
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| Oil marbled paper from the Workshop of Alex Peltzer, Munich. |
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| Paste paper (and half-linen) binding by a 1st year apprentice. No, the label was not adhered to the cover. |
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| Taking one of the haddock and stretching it out to make parchment. We'll compare with the egg tanned haddock. |
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| All right, that's done. Now to let it dry. |
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| Why do I always get the grunt work? Beat the egg, oil, detergent mixture until smooth. |
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| Next, tamp the haddock and salmon so that they are not dripping wet. |
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| At least I didn't have to drop the skins into the egg/oil mixture to then massage it into the skins until warm. That looked totally gross! But, wait! I get roll up the slimy skins so that they can sit for about 15 minutes. |
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| Now we hang them up to drip-dry. When dry, they'll still feel oily/slippery, and we'll need to massage and work them to loosen up the fibers in the skin. We do that for a week. |
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| Here they are a week later. Time to rinse in soapy water until they feel soft and not oily/slippery. |
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| Rinse, and rinse some more... |
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| Let drip-dry. We tamped with a paper towel again, too. |
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| Then, dump them into a more dilute mixture, work in, and set out to dry. |
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| We smoothed them out to dry on a piece of plexi-glass, scale-side down. That gives them a shinier appearance. When they were dryish, we worked them back and forth over a smooth dowel, always with the flesh side to the dowel. Finally, we worked it like leather before paring. |
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| Take out the pins and liberate the haddock parchment. Next we'll compare. |
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| Comparing the haddocks – parchment at the bottom, egg tanned at top. The egg tanned is like parchment, but much shiner and more transparent. Not sure how we feel about that... The whitish patches are fleshy stuff that will need to be scrapped off with a scalpel later. The haddock is much more thin-skinned than the salmon. |
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| See what I mean by transparent and shiny? |
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| And here the egg tanned salmon. Less translucent than the salmon parchment that was made when @bookbinderbarbie was here over a month ago. Softer too, but not supple like leather. Still. looks and feels really interesting. Wonder if we'll make anything with it? |
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| Documenting his first go at making parchment from fish. |
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| A few weeks ago, Fritz Otto skinned the fillets we got, freezing the skins until we're ready. This is the coho. |
Back at it, again, with haddock and cohoe salmon. Will try egg tanning with some. Added research for an article on #fishskinbinding. pic.twitter.com/crrhbVUlYf— Peter D. Verheyen (@PressbengelProj) August 31, 2019
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| The skins were rinsed in unscented/un-dyed dish detergent to help remove oils. This process was repeated a few times, the skins kept in the refrigerator in-between to prevent decay. |
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| Next I showed him how to remove any remaining fleshy bits from the skin. |
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| He used a scalpel and scrapped away... |
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| Tiring work he just wanted to hide after. He said it was kind-of gross. I gave him some space... |
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| Reading up from Nienke Hoogvliet's instructions from her book Fish Leather |
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| Braunwarth & Lüthke, München, Braunwarth & Lüthke - Preis-Liste über Materialien, Werkzeuge, Beschläge, Apparate und Maschinen für Buchbindereien und verwandte Branchen.1928. |
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| Scanning all 138 pages with Fritz Otto's help. No worries, the signatures were all loosely sew and the wrapper off, so no damage. |
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| Complete tool sets for apprentices just starting out, and those more advanced. Included were a bone folder, bookbinding knife, paring knife, scissors, sewing needles, keys for securing raised cords in the sewing frame, a green linen apron. The advanced included more of some of the tools and a divider. Mk 14 and 17 respectively. (Page 42) |
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| Everything needed to equip a small hand bindery. Mk 1620 (Page 125) |
