About the cover:

Leather binding, attached covers Light brown oasis goatskin spine, attached covers covered with red-brown oasis goatskin, each cover is divided by two vertical, slightly recessed ornaments made of multicoloured oasis goatskin leather overlays in a blind-stamped, wavy surface, yellow coloured edges on three sides, leather endpapers, endpapers made of laid paper throughout, hinged case covered with beige madras fabric, lined with red-brown suede, recessed ornamental form on front cover.

About the content:

Sketchbook Thorvald Henningsen designed and produced this cover as a gift for his friend Albert Burkhardt on his 65th birthday. He died shortly after sending the package with the cover to the post office on 31 May 1977.

About the artist: Thorvald Henningsen was born in Lausanne in 1896 and served his bookbinding apprenticeship with Konrad Hänsler in Zurich from 1910 to 1914. He gained a wide range of professional experience at various workplaces in Switzerland. After receiving his master’s certificate in 1921, he managed the Schumacher bookbindery in Bern. In 1946, he took over a bookbinding workshop at Napfgasse 4 in Zurich’s old town, directly above Café Schober. The following years, he was very active until selling his workshop in 1972: in addition to managing his soon highly renowned workshop, he taught at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Zurich and in Bern and gave evening classes for bookbinders as well as preparatory courses for the master’s certificate examination. He was on the board of the Association Kantonal-Zürcher Buchbindermeister-Verein and the Museum of Bookbinding, as well as being involved in promotional films and trade exhibitions. He became known beyond Switzerland as the author of specialist books and articles.