Photo by Sophia Kramer
About the Binder
Cara Schlesinger, the proprietor of Faenwyl Bindery, is a bench-trained bookbinder and book conservator. She’s spent years as a caretaker of rare, valuable, and beloved books and ephemera, with two key goals: preserving their integrity and longevity as treasured objects, and ensuring the ongoing safe use of the information they contain—whether that information is literary, artistic, historical, scientific, photographic, or sentimental. She treats each piece entrusted to her with respect and care, always bearing your priorities in mind.
Cara has provided conservation services and/or custom boxes to the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Thomas J. Watson Library, Columbia University Libraries, Peabody Essex Museum, Grolier Club, and numerous private libraries, religious institutions, serious collectors, and antiquarian book and antiques dealers.
Willa Bean, Quality Control Manager
Her training began at the Center for Book Arts in New York City and continued through private study, volunteering at the Met’s Sherman Fairchild Center for Book Conservation, and ongoing professional development at the American Academy of Bookbinding, Rare Book School, and International Academic Projects (IAP), among others. She served as the elected editor of the Guild of Book Workers Journal for ten years.
Henry Poppet, Tools and Inventory Manager
So, what’s a Fænwyl?
Not long after her introduction to bookbinding, Cara awoke from a dream (yes, true story) in which she had a daughter named “Fa’enwyl.” She knew the spelling of the name but not how it was pronounced, what it meant, or where it had come from. After fruitlessly searching dictionaries and encyclopedias, she adopted the apparently imagined word as her bindery name, dropping the apostrophe and using a ligature in a nod to the typographic roots of the printed book. She decided to pronounce it "FEN-will.”
More than a decade passed. Then, as bedtime reading one night, she pulled out a novel that had been a childhood favorite, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, by Madeleine L’Engle. It had been at least twenty years since she’d read it last. "Surprise" only begins to describe how she felt when she turned a page and found one character greeting another, “Croeso f'annwyl.” There was her word at last, spelled correctly, apostrophe and all. As it turned out, the Welsh word “f’annwyl” (pronounced "FAN-will") means “my dear,” and her own name, “cara,” in Italian means “dear.” She had named the bindery after herself.
“Croeso f'annwyl.” From A Swiftly Tilting Planet, by Madeleine L’Engle.
Media Features
The Oddest Terms Used for Antique Books, Explained
A short by D. W. Young (see 2:53)
Between the Pages: Cara Schlesinger’s Dedication to Book Conservation
A video profile by James Bisceglia
Bookbinding - A portrait in New York City
A documentary short by Rouven Gueissaz
NYIABF Presents: Sharing the World of Rare Books, In conversation with Jesse Paris Smith
Join Jesse Paris Smith in conversation with Julien Paganetti, Jesse R. Erickson, Cara Schlesinger and Patti Smith, four unique voices connected with the NY Antiquarian Book Fair and the world of rare books and manuscripts. (see 9:38, 17:07, 35:24)
