McKey Winston Berkman
While a bookbinding student at The North Bennet Street School in Boston, I was introduced to the world of late nineteenth-century artist-designed publishers’ bindings through Mindell Dubansky’s wonderful book The Proper Decoration of Book Covers: The Life and Work of Alice C. Morse, which accompanied a 2008 Grolier Club exhibition. That book sparked my interest in studying and collecting American women book designers, from Helena de Kay, who in the 1870s paved the way for the next generation of women designers, to the principal figures of Sarah Wyman Whitman, Margaret Armstrong and Alice C. Morse in the late 1880s through the ‘90s. Working in book cover design and stained glass, these women were influenced by the movements of the day: Aestheticism, Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau, and Japanism.
The field of designer bindings included many talented women working for the major publishing houses. Biographies and bibliographies abound. My collection includes covers by Marion L. Peabody, Bertha Stuart, Lee Thayer of Decorative Designers, and Amy Sacker. Many designers “signed” their bindings with a monogram incorporated into the design, which adds an element of fun to the collecting. You’ll find monograms in four of the five books I have chosen to share.
Richard Watson Gilder. The New Day: A Poem in Songs and Sonnets. New York: Scribner, Armstrong and Company, 1876. Cover design by Helena de Kay.
This binding design by Helena de Kay (1846-1916) is a superb example of American Aestheticism and is considered the first publisher’s binding designed by a woman in the United States. Her design for The New Day, a book of poetry by de Kay’s husband, is a gold peacock feather stamped with hatched lines to give the effect of iridescence… one of the most exquisite books in my collection.
Ian Maclaren. Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush. New York: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1896. Cover design by Alice C. Morse.
After studying art and design at the Woman’s Art School of the Cooper Union, Alice Morse (1863-1961) worked briefly for Tiffany & Co. before switching her focus to designing book covers. She created over 83 decorative covers, varying her style to each book. Stamped in light grey-green, this thistle design in the Art Nouveau style contains Morse’s monogram “A” and “M” at the bottom edge of the design. Morse also used a fused “A” and “M” for her signature.
Sarah Orne Jewett. Betty Leicester: A Story for Girls. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1890. Cover design by Sarah Wyman Whitman.
Of the 250 covers attributed to the Bostonian Sarah Wyman Whitman (1842-1904), only 14 bear her monogram. In Betty Leicester, by close friend Sarah Orne Jewett, the “SW” monogram is found within a heart at the base of a stylized flower. The lettering design and the use of two cloth colors are distinctive of Whitman’s book cover art. Other Whitman bindings in my collection evoke Japanese stab bindings and early Western book furniture, such as clasps and hinges.
Arthur J. Stringer. The Loom of Destiny. Boston: Small, Maynard and Co., 1899. [1907 Edition]. Cover design by Marion Louise Peabody.
The Loom of Destiny, a series of stories about poor children in New York City, shows the influence of Art Nouveau on the designs of Marion L. Peabody (1869-after 1922). On the front cover, intertwined loops pulled by a pair of hands represent the tangled web of fate; on the rear cover, a hand cuts through the web with shears. The silver gilt boldly contrasts to the navy cloth, creating an image that is both frightening and beautiful.
John Greenleaf Whittier. The Tent on the Beach and Dramatic Lyrics. Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1899. Cover design by Margaret Armstrong.
Of her over 300 designs, I most admire Margaret Armstrong’s cover for Whittier’s The Tent on the Beach. Her exposure to the Aesthetic, Arts and Crafts, and Art Nouveau movements, and to stain glass design, is evident in this design. The stylized irises, emanating from crabs, flank undulating lines that evoke waves and create an astonishing sense of movement. Armstrong’s monogram of an “M” crossed over an “A” is at the bottom right corner.