Boffin Bookplates

An illustration series highlighting the geeks and bookworms of history through hand-drawn bookplates.

I often talk about my affinity for books but I don’t just mean I like reading them - they are beautiful objects. Whether it’s a beautiful leather bound and gilded volume or a dog eared paperbacks. Back in the day people used to declare ownership of their books by sticking a bookplate, or personalised label in the front of their books declaring ‘Ex Libris’, Latin for ‘from the library of’. They are often quite beautiful works of art, sometimes decorative, sometimes funny.

As a personal passion project I’ve decided to highlight some of my favourite boffins (people who are experts of their field and have arcane knowledge or skills) by creating bookplates for them. This is the result.