Book of autographs collected by Eleanor Joachim, ca. 1903.
Three small fine leather bindings by Eleanor Joachim were donated by her to the Reed Collection in the early 1950s.
Mary Eleanor Joachim (1874-1957) was born in England, but her family came to New Zealand in 1876 and settled in Mornington, Dunedin. Educated at home and at Otago Girls’ High School, Joachim’s family life was richly artistic, as her mother Susanna and two aunts were watercolour painters. Joachim travelled to London in 1903 to learn the art of fine leather bookbinding in the esteemed workshop of Sangorski & Sutcliffe.
Upon her return to Dunedin in 1904, Joachim set up a bindery in Crawford Street, until 1907 when she transferred it to the family home in Randall (later English) Avenue. Joachim exhibited with the Otago Art Society, the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts in Wellington, the Auckland Arts and Crafts Club exhibition of 1912, and also in Melbourne. Her bindings elicited praise for their gold-tooled and blind-tooled decoration.
This book of autographs has been bound by Joachim in full dark blue-green morocco with a gold-tooled flower and leaf design. It contains a frontispiece drawn by Francis Sangorski.
