President's report 2025

Welcome to the 2025 AGM of the NSW Guild of Craft Bookbinders.

The Bindery

The year has been steady. The Guild has remained financially solvent. Our tenancy here in Garry Owen House is not in doubt. Our relationship with Writing NSW is friendly and uncomplicated. Over the last 5 years since 2020, which encompasses COVID shutdowns, cuts to Writing NSW funding, the eviction of a long-term tenant, the staff in the office seems to have changed completely twice. The new team seems oblivious to any past issues!

A couple of Wednesdays ago we received an impromptu visit from our overlord, a team from Create NSW. The bindery was buzzing with members busily working on projects, the impression was excellent. We were here using the space, members were engaging and the Guild was obviously healthy.

More specifically relating to the bindery, we are continuing to improve it. By improve I mean functionality, assess equipment and materials. It is slow process. It is interesting how little changes can make a big difference. Such as the shelving unit beside the sink. What used to be known as ‘the dead brush corner’ has disappeared. It is easier to keep the sink area clean and clear. However we haven’t managed to get the boxes out from under the benches and off floor but I think that’s an ongoing reality we will have to live with! Our next big change will be replacing the hard worked plan chests with a new set of 100% working drawers.

Courses

As you all know memberships and courses are our two main revenue streams.

Bookbinding for beginners remains our outreach course through Sydney Community College. Bookings have been solid and continue to bring 80–100 new faces into the bindery every year. Here I would like to thank Avril for her commitment to the beginners. It’s not an easy task juggle 10 beginners with skills which range from cack-handed to competent.

Course highlights have been Karen Vidler returning to teach Board Reattachment Techniques, Kathy Lobo returning to teach the Chinese thread book and pop-up books and, in conjunction with Andersen’s bindery and Bind 25, Coleen Curry teaching leather dying techniques and the flexible leather binding. These visiting binders add a wonderful diversity to the program without putting an extra work load on the committee.

We look forward to Karen Vidler returning again next year in April to teach Repair of Cloth Bindings. Also former member now based in Brisbane Michelle Vandermeer will be teaching two courses in February; the Cross Structure Binding and the Secret Belgian Binding. Crista Wocadlo is joining the teaching team.

The course programming challenge over the last year has been to try to understand the demand and program accordingly. Courses which booked out immediately 2 years ago suddenly get meagre bookings. We are not sure why. We have never done any analytics on engagement. But it might be something we look into. I have noticed a couple of trends. One is that out of the beginners courses fewer students are signing up to membership. Was there was a post COVID high? Has the idea of bookbinding changed from the time when people, all our long term members, would sign up to a year long TAFE evening courses? Has bookbinding become more of novelty activity? To deal with this programming challenge we are looking at introducing new courses, thus having a wider pool of courses to choose from when programming.

Website

The new website has been online now for 11 months. It has been a challenge dealing with the admin side. It is more complicated and sophisticated than the previous Big Cartel platform. Every platform has its quirks! We are still learning. Stefania Riccardi who managed the changeover is now living back in Italy, but is still there for trouble shooting and responds quickly, so we don’t feel completely abandoned.

Morocco Bound

Morocco Bound is a publication of the NSW Guild yet now has the a brief to connect the Australian bookbinding community not just NSW. It is a testament to the Guilds and the bookbinders of Australia that it is still in publication after 46 years. The current editorial team has a national representation. In the upcoming issues we will be publishing a selection talks from Bind 25 bringing in international and New Zealand voices. I would like to thank Joy Tonkin in particular for her leadership of the team and Avril Makula for the graphic design. We farewell Tony Baker from the team, and welcome Stephanie Booth and the return of Karen Vidler.

Bind 27

Recently Jules and I and several members were in Auckland for the Bind 25 conference. The NSW Guild committee has stepped up to take on the next conference in two years. Conferences and the satellite workshops are important not just for the knowledge exchange and learning but also for the meeting up, for heightening our sense of being part of a larger bookbinding community. We are looking forward to working towards bringing out some excellent international binders and of course giving our local expert binders a chance to share their knowledge.

Thank you

I would like to thank my committee, for the skills they bring to running the Guild. Special thanks to Avril Makula and Jules Dalgliesh. I would like to thank all our ‘in-house’ tutors of 2025: Avril Makula, Ted Chapman, Nicholas Beckett, Jean Kropper, Petra Weber and Glenda Hutchison. I would like to thank Margaret Scott as fellow monitor. Liliana Navarro for her ongoing work on cataloguing the library books.

I would like to thank you, the members. Without you there would be no Guild. It is particularly nice to see members today who renew every year but no longer attend classes or member access days. Welcome back.

Monica Oppen

November 2025