The binding is the first thing you see and the last thing most catalogs mention. In Shelvd, it gets the attention it deserves — 49 cover types, from full calf to stapled wrappers, each describing a specific combination of material and construction. All 49 are translated into thirteen languages for the catalog entry generator, so a French dealer sees "Plein maroquin" where a German sees "Ganzmaroquin" and a Swede sees "Helfranskt band."
Cover Types vs. Binding Styles
Shelvd distinguishes between two things:
- Cover Type — what the book is covered in (the material and extent of coverage)
- Binding — how the book is held together (the construction technique)
The cover type dropdown lists options like "Full leather," "Half calf with marbled boards," "Publisher's cloth," "Paper wrappers." The binding field is for the structural technique: "case binding," "quarter binding," "limp vellum," "perfect binding."
A Brief Tour of Cover Materials
Leather: The aristocrat of bindings. Full leather means the entire cover is leather. Half leather means the spine and corners are leather, with paper or cloth sides. Quarter leather means only the spine.
Common leathers: calf (smooth, pale, ages to honey brown), morocco (goatskin, grained, durable), vellum (calfskin or sheepskin, creamy white, used since the Middle Ages), pigskin (heavily grained, common in German bindings), russia (distinctive smell, smooth, often dyed red or green).
Cloth: From the 1820s onward, publisher's cloth became standard. Colors, grains, and blocked designs varied enormously. A Victorian cloth binding in beveled boards with gilt titling is a different beast from a 1960s buckram library binding.
Paper: Paper wrappers (the precursor to the paperback), printed wrappers, decorated paper boards, and the ubiquitous dust jacket — a paper covering that was once thrown away and is now often worth more than the book inside it.
Boards: Plain boards (cardboard without covering), Dutch gilt paper boards, marbled paper boards, paste paper boards. Common in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Protective Enclosures
Beyond the binding itself, Shelvd records protective enclosures: slipcases, clamshell boxes, chemises, solander boxes, dust jackets. These are the book's armor — the things that protect the binding from light, dust, and the collector's own handling.
What to Record
For each book, select the Cover Type that best matches what you see. If the book is in a half calf binding with marbled boards, select "Half calf" (or "Half leather" if the specific leather isn't certain). Add details in the Condition Notes field: "Half calf binding with contemporary marbled boards, spine with five raised bands and gilt title, corners lightly rubbed."
The combination of cover type, binding, condition, and notes gives anyone reading the record a complete picture of what the book looks like physically — which is, after all, the point.
📖 Related on the blog: A Field Guide to Bindings, The Dust Jacket Problem