Monique Lallier
2003 WINNER: Jury Prize for Design

I started bookbinding in 1970 in Montreal with Simone B. Roy. I went on studying gold tooling with Roger Arnoult in Paris and also went to Ascona to study with Edwin Heim and Hugo Peller. I had a studio in Montreal (Les Relieurs Artisans) for eight years before I moved to the United States in 1987. I now live and work in North Carolina. I teach students from all over the country and work on various binding projects and commissions, and I do conservation work for Etherington Conservation Center. Thirty-two years of bookbinding is a blessing.

DESIGN PROPOSAL. The binding will be a full leather French technique using black French Morocco du Cap. There will be raised boards delineating the river beds. Creased pewter is used to represent the rivers: Mississippi (main part of the front cover), Ohio (top right corner), Missouri (upper left side going on the back cover), and Arkansas (lower left side going on the back cover). Onlays of different colors represent all the emotions (i.e., passion, kindness, sadness, love, possessiveness, selfishness, loyalty, trust, ...) experienced by Huck, Tom, Jim, Miss Watson, and Aunt Polly in Huckleberry Finn. Onlays of marbled paper and thin wood on the pewter represent the island and the raft. The title will be hand tooled on the lower part of the spine with white gold, to harmonize with the pewter, and the author's name will be hand tooled just above the river line. A black full leather pull-up box will be made, showing the pewter on the front cover. A clamshell box will protect the whole.

SAMPLE BINDING. John Muir. Heaven on Heart. Wood engraving by Charles D. Jones. Austin: Press Intermezzo, 1998.
 
Full Buffalo leather French technique binding with edge-to-edge leather doublures and flyleaves. The leather was creased. Pewter onlays over boards underlying the leather. Silk embroidered headbands. Bound in 2001.