Aldine or Italian Style. Ornaments of solid face without any shading whatever, such as used by Aldus and other early Italian printers. The ornaments are of Arabic character. A style appropriate for early printed literature.
All-along. When a volume is sewed, and the thread passes from kettlestitch to kettlestitch, or from end to end in each sheet, it is said to be sewed all-along.
American Russia. See Cowhide.
Antique. See Blind-tooled.
Arabesque Style. A fanciful mixture of animals, birds, insects, and of plants, fruits and foliage, involved and twisted.
Arming press. See Blocking press.
Art canvas. A book cloth, made in several colors by the Holliston Mills, 67 Fifth Ave., New York; Jos. Bancroft & Sons, Wilmington, Del. (A. D. Smith, 35 Thomas St., New York, agent); the Interlaken Mills, 111 Duane St., New York, and others.
It is known both as art canvas and buckram. The Newark library, in experimenting to find a substitute for leather, tried in succession the green, red, brown and blue. The green proved the poorest, the blue made by Holliston Mills the best in wearing quality. One reason for the poor results with all the colors tried, with the exception of the blue, is that the cloth of these colors is made with a colored thread running one way and a gray or white thread the other; the colored thread soon wears off on the edges and corners and the gray thread gives the book a very dingy appearance. Dark blue has given us the best results. Art canvas costs 22 cents a square yard by the roll of 40 yards.
Art vellum. A book cloth made in several colors and styles of finish by the firms which make art canvas. It is not suitable for full binding on books subject to much wear. It costs about 16 cents per square yard. Most publishers’ bindings are in cloth of the art vellum grade.