In many eras of the past, books were the luxury of the wealthy – bound to suit the individual. As the literate public increased and its appetite for books followed, publishers began to take on the task of producing elaborate bindings. The industrial revolution enabled the process of binding to become more automated, and more elaborately decorated bindings could be mass produced. A mechanical process allowed cloth bindings to be imprinted, stamped and gilded to resemble the fine bindings traditionally produced by hand. Publishers’ bindings enjoyed popularity from 1830 to the end of the 1930s when they were replaced by decorative dust jackets – or printed paper covers placed over the cloth covers of a book. Although we’ve all been warned not to judge a book by the cover, these beautiful volumes disprove the premise of that theory.