Rebinding versus Facsimile Jackets

I think it depends on the books concerned, their value, and what you are trying to achieve. A facsimile jacket is a cheap and easy way of making a book look more presentable on the shelf, whilst retaining the originality of that book (and adding a bit more of what the original purchaser would have had, such as the jacket blurb, etc).

A rebind is a much more expensive undertaking that turns the book into something else, which may be a piece of art in its own right -- but is quite different than what you started with. Whether a rebind adds, removes or doesn't impact the monetary value is really going to be down to the book chosen and the quality/style of the rebind. A facsimile jacket might adjust the value of the book by $20 just by making it a bit more presentable in one of the photos you would show on eBay, but it is just a disposable piece of paper.

My personal preference is to avoid rebinding something unless it is very tired, but there have been some really nice rebinds shared on here if you use the search and have a look at some of the results.


Edit:

Also worth considering that facsimile dust-jackets are not all made the same, and that accuracy is a problem, both of colours and content. I have found that the commercially available offerings have not met my needs. I'll post up a picture later on of my version of a jacket, vs the commercial version (and why the commercial version didn't really work for me). If you have the software and skills and can source scans, photographs, etc, producing jackets can be a lot of fun. Of the very small handful of my own books that I have put facsimile jackets on, I have tossed most of them out multiple times and reprinted improved versions. It is a hobby...

Any thoughts on the value of the Chelsea Bindery binding of the trilogy? It is pricey, but I have to admit it seems impressive…

Entshelm wrote:

Any thoughts on the value of the Chelsea Bindery binding of the trilogy? It is pricey, but I have to admit it seems impressive…

A bindery like Chelsea can bind it however you want within reason, so value would probably be dependent on the individual choices the person commissioning the binding made. They are well respected (though I personally haven't seen anything from them that especially blew me away).

Yes, as Stu said, it really just depends on the situation and condition of the books in question to be rebound. Rebinding is a great way to take a set of books in bad shape and give them new life, while at the same time adding to the aesthetic value of your shelf. You just want to make sure that you're not putting a $20 saddle on a $10 horse...by that I mean a very expensive binding for a relatively cheap book. IMO

I go back and forth on facsimile dust wrappers. Urulókë said something to me the other day, that made a lot of sense. Something like "money for facsimile dust wrappers cuts into my money for more books" sorry Jeremy...I'm sure I butchered your quote.

Also, when I have asked Stu for a scan of a DJ to print out he has always provided me one if he is able.

I have a thing or two to say about this!

Do you have facebook? Probably it’s best if we message via facebook messanger.

The_Antiquarian wrote:

I have a thing or two to say about this!

Do you have facebook? Probably it’s best if we message via facebook messanger.

You can private message users via this site, click on the username and then send message.

I finally got around to printing the first version of The Hobbit facsimile first jacket that I submitted to HarperCollins (before it was sharpened up and with the original, rather than the [sadly] reset flap text). I definitely prefer it to what we ended up with after a bunch of editing by HC and then me, so my copy is going to live on on this jacket and I've popped the official one in a drawer. At some point, I might re-edit this one and do the good stuff that was done to make the official one, but not all the less-good stuff. Unfortunately there isn't any way of fixing the official one and taking the original, and sharpening it again is a ton of work (though I do have a better scan of a different copy now with less compression artifacts).

Still do not understand why they did not scan the dust-wrapper blurb on the facsimile edition from an original jacket.

Trotter wrote:

Still do not understand why they did not scan the dust-wrapper blurb on the facsimile edition from an original jacket.

They only had mine at the time. I assume they weren’t happy with the variations in black level on the text. I had to do a lot of cleanup because of the limitations of the scan, and it wasn’t perfect.