The Australian Bookplate Award is running its exhibition until the 19 December at Library at The Dock, 107 Victoria Harbour Promenade, Docklands. I haven’t been down to see yet, but it looks as though at least one of our family bookplates will be part of the exhibition, judging from this lovely newspaper article. Click the link below to visit the article.
Under the covers: bookplates offer a window into ‘untold histories’
Robert Littlewood with some of the bookplates included in the exhibition. Photo: Joe Armao
A Geoffrey Ricardo design. Photo: Joe Armao
A Dianne Fogwell design. Photo: Joe Armao
A Megan Fisher design. Photo: Joe Armao
A Judy Watson design. Photo: Joe Armao
A Larissa Macfarlane design. Photo: Joe Armao
My husband Scott thinks that bookplates bear a remarkable similarity to wine labels in many respects. I hadn’t thought of that (surprisingly) but had compared them with stamps. I can imagine opening a bottle of Amelia Beecroft Pinot Grigio though, it’s true.
I’m surprised that this biennial award doesn’t attract more entries. It’s a rather fascinating art form and so wonderfully relevant to book illustrators. It seems an especially appealing project for schools to participate in as well. But as I discovered The Australian Bookplate Design Award only this year, perhaps others too will fall in love with bookplates in the near future.
endpapers 
When you see beautiful bookplates like this it makes you realise what wonderful things they are, what a great artform they are, and how they enhance a book. I see very few of them in use now, I do hope they become more popular again, these are wonderful.
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Hi Phil. Thanks for stopping by. Part of the problem possibly, is that to a book collector a bookplate pasted into a book usually devalues it unless it is designed by someone famous or for someone famous. I really enjoyed pasting them into some of our books a few weeks ago and they definitely enhanced the books. But I couldn’t bring myself to put them into books with beautiful endpapers.
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