Abstract

During the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the Arts and Crafts Movement, led by John Ruskin and William Morris, was created in response to the undesirable social upheavals caused by the Industrial Revolution. The Movement advocated a way of life that was filled with essential art rather than superficialities, which had become a standard of the nineteenth century. Bookbinding was among the decorative arts recast by the Arts and Crafts Movement. L. Averill Cole, a singular woman bookbinder of that era, adhered to the medieval craftsman’s ideals of beauty, simplicity, and utility in her work. Believing that a successful binding was a ‘translation’ of the book text, Cole introduced a new and unique philosophy to bookbinding theory. Her monumental achievement in bookbinding was to raise the level of the craft to a fine art and introduce a new school of artistry in bookbinding.