Bookbinding at the Research Library
A short note on the workshops in the building most people don’t know exists.
The Rijksmuseum Research Library — a separate building at Hobbemastraat 22 — runs occasional bookbinding workshops in the spring. I attended one in 2024 and have been thinking about it ever since.
The Research Library is the largest art-history research library in the Netherlands, but it does not advertise itself loudly. You enter through a small front desk, you sign in with a passport, and you climb a curved staircase to reading rooms that have not changed substantially since the 1980s.
The bookbinding workshop, held in the conservation studio on the upper floor, is led by senior conservators. Participants sew sample sections, paste endpapers, and learn the difference between Coptic and link stitch. It is genuinely demanding — three hours of careful work — and it is also one of the kindest forms of museum education I have encountered.
Information about future workshops can be found on the public-facing website of the museum’s research department. I am not affiliated with the institution; I attended as a paying member of the public.
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