Internationally acclaimed bookbinder Jenni Grey has been President of Designer Bookbinders and has regular contracts to bind the Mann Booker winning novel. She won the Sir Paul Getty Bodleian Bookbinding Prize in 2009. She works with materials such as wood and metal, and techniques such as embroidery.
Jenni Grey Jenni Grey University of Brighton
Blind Assassin Blind Assassin, Jenni Grey, University of Brighton Faculty of Arts
The Bible To Be Read as Literature The Bible To Be Read as Literature, Jenni Grey, University of Brighton Faculty of Arts
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, Jenni Grey, University of Brighton Faculty of Arts
Working with the Faculty of Arts at the University of Brighton until 2010, Jenni Grey was a student at the former Brighton Polytechnic in Graphic Design/Illustration (1984) and MA Narrative Illustration/Sequential Design (1991).
Contracted for many years to bind the Mann Booker prize winning novels, Jenni Grey, was awarded one of the two Sir Paul Getty Bodleian Bookbinding Prizes in 2009 and also received an engraved silver medal in the Designer Bookbinders/ Bodleian Library international bookbinding competition. In the same year she was the only non-MBE to be awarded the prestigious Clothworkers Company commission. She was elected onto Crafts Council Selected Index 1986 and elected Fellow of Designer Bookbinders 1989, becoming President of Designer Bookbinders 1996-98.
Grey has exhibited with Designer Bookbinders and other organisations since 1984, and has work in private collections and institutions such as The British Library, The National Poetry Library, John Rylands Library and Winchester Cathedral (England), The Library of Congress (USA), The Koninklijke Bibliotheek (Holland) and the Biblioteca Wittockiana (Belgium).
Jenni Grey's many achievements as a bookbinder and lecturer on the Illustration and Graphic Design programme at Brighton included:
2009
Sir Paul Getty Bodleian Bookbinding Prize - silver medal for 'Water - Waterborn'
The Clothworkers Company commission. Grey was the only non MBE to be awarded a commission.
Article, Design for Bookbinders, The New Bookbinder, Volume 29
The Artworkers Guild lecture on Design for Bookbinders.
2008
House of Lords exhibition of the Lord Sawyer collection.
Kyffin – A Celebration.
An exhibition of bookbindings of a limited edition book, with a foreword by HRH the Prince of Wales, produced by the Gregynog Press to celebrate the work of Sir Kyffin Williams. Selected Fellows and Licentiates from Designer Bookbinders were invited to produce bindings for the project.
Exhibition Touring Dates in 2008: Gwasg Gregynog, Tregynon, Newtown, Powys; The National Library of Wales, Penglais, Aberystwyth; Contemporary Applied Arts, London; Stour Galler, Shipton-on-Stour; John Rylands Library, Manchester.
An exhibition of bookbindings selected by a committee from Flow and Designer Bookbinders. Flow Gallery, London. Two individual bindings accepted ‘The Book of Job’ and ‘Country Calendar’.
2006
Progress Making – article for The New Bookbinder Vol 26.
2004
I remember… – article for The New Bookbinder Vol 24.
