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We willremember them

• Peterborough
• first world war
• remembrance book
• Design and planning

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The WWII Remembrance Book written in 1952 by
Freda Hands. Until November 2007, the City of
Peterborough did not have a formal memorial to
those killed in the First World War, other than
the website Peterborough War Memorial by David
Gray. To rectify this the City Council decided to
produce a Remembrance Book to be housed in the
Sprites Chapel in Peterborough Cathedral. It was
to be displayed next-door to the book
commemorating the Second World War.. The Council
wanted the First World War Remembrance Book to
match this one as closely as possible. The WWI
book would have 1,127 entries spread over 208
pages. There was also to be a title page
including gilding and three pages with the
heraldic insignia of the Navy, Army and RAF. When
closed the page measured 8 x 12 inches or 20.3 x
30.5cm.
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Design and trials
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Left - First trials of the colour to match the
blue initials in the WWII book.
Right Trials of different inks and paints for
military awards to be written in red. Vermilion
stick ink was chosen (not shown).
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foundational
italic
Trials of the style of writing. I wanted a
strong block of writing but the Foundational
was too wide to fit all the information on the
page so I settled on italic at a reasonably heavy
weight.
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1
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More Trials. 1. Writing is too small and too
light giving no impact to the page. 2. Better but
the entries are too far apart so doesnt give a
good block. 3. Top margin is too small. 4.
Initial letters have been reduced by 1mm giving a
better block.
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Draft on vellum
The book was originally to have written on vellum
(calfskin) but due to a tight deadline (the
vellum would have taken at least five weeks to
manufacture) this was changed to paper. These
trials were carried out before that decision was
made.
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Final draft of a double page opening for approval
by the client.
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Rough design for the Title page When designing
any piece of work I start by doing some pencil
sketches, then try different styles, sizes and
colours of writing. I cut the various pieces of
text out and lay them out and play with the
design, changing text, line breaks and spacing.
Once Im happy with the design I paste it down. I
measure the placement for each line or element,
where each line starts from the left and also how
long each line is. I then rule up a clean page
and write it out completely. Only then can I
judge exactly whether the spacing looks right. I
make any adjustments and write it again until Im
happy.
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Final draft of title page This draft was
presented for approval to the client and signed
by them. The draft uses shell gold (24 carat gold
powder in a tablet form) rather than the gold
leaf on gesso which would be used in the final
book. Shell gold is quicker to use which means
the draft takes less time to prepare but gives a
matt surface rather than the bright, shiny
surface of gold leaf.
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planning
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A complete mock-up of the book was done on
computer. The way a manuscript book is bound
means that there are 4 pages per sheet and the
text on the right-hand page doesnt necessarily
follow on in order from the left-hand page. This
meant the book had to be planned meticulously so
the names were in the right order once bound. A
warning system was used (green for longish
entries and purple for very long entries) to tell
me when to use a smaller nib or to compress the
writing where necessary to ensure it fitted.
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production
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Plan for the measurements and ruling up of the
text pages.
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Work in Progress my desk during the writing of
the book. On the left is the mock-up with a ruler
which I placed under the line I was writing as
this helped to reduce errors. Had I made a
mistake on the last entry of a sheet it would
have taken an extra day and a quarter to re-do it.
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As each sheet of paper was cut to size, folded,
numbered, ruled and then written, they were kept
carefully wrapped in the drawer of my plan chest.
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Due to the size and complexity of this project a
plan was drawn up so I could keep a close eye on
progress. This was kept on my wall and each day
the number of pages written was marked off. To
meet the deadline, I wrote 4 pages per day which
was quite a punishing schedule. Some pages were
written out of order so I could send them to
Timothy Noad who worked on the gilding and
heraldry whilst I carried on with the rest. The
whole project took about six months to complete
and was finished the day before the deadline. It
then took the binder a further month to bind the
book.
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To see pictures of the final book please return
to the slide show gallery and click on
Peterborough WWI remembrance book Final book