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I recently taught two book repair workshops in Hickory on December 4th and in Chapel Hill on December 11th. Both workshops were sponsored by the NC State Library, part of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

On Monday, December 4th, I taught book repair to 12 participants at the Patrick Beaver Public Library in Hickory. The class was attentive and enthusiastic to learn basic repair skills and came from Lincoln, Randolph, Alexander and Catawba counties in North Carolina.

In this class, I taught tipping-in loose pages, using heat-set tissue for paper tears, using Japanese tissue to repair broken joints and spine replacement.

On Monday, December 11th, I taught 12 attendees at the beautiful Chapel Hill Public Library. This library is a highly functioning, open and inviting library which is hidden in a residential area and connected to a city greenway. In addition to attendees from the Research Triangle area, there were also participants from Fayetteville and Bath, NC. This group was super quiet but very attentive. I covered the same material as I did in Hickory but also demonstrated replacing end sheets and repairing damaged corners. At the end of the instruction, I advised each participant on repairs to books they brought from their home institution that needed attention.

They thanked me one by one at the end of the day which was very rewarding. Many public libraries struggle to get the skills and materials for book repair, and the State Library purchased a small repair kit for each attendee. I enjoyed both workshops and found the positive responses very rewarding.