portraits
Portrait
Arts & Crafts

Laurel Parker and Paul Chamard

By mixing traditional techniques with 21st century innovations, we can produce timeless objects.

The bodies and souls of Laurel Parker Book, Laurel Parker and Paul Chamard are much more than the directors of an exceptional bookbinding workshop. Both defenders of tradition and explorers of innovative techniques, the duo are the very heart of a dedication to sublimation.

Published on 13/12/2019

2 min

The story begins with Laurel Parker and reads as a series of encounters.

First with the arts, fine arts and history, which she discovered in the prestigious schools and colleges of her home country, the United States. Laurel Parker graduated from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston in the early 1990s.

Then an encounter with an object, that of the artist's book, prompted her to continue her apprenticeship at the Center for Book Arts in New York.

Then came the meeting with a city, Paris, where in 2008 she founded Laurel Parker Book, a new kind of workshop devoted to bookbinding.

Finally came the meeting with the person who would become her partner and, in 2011, the workshop’s production manager, Paul Chamard, a former student of the École Estienne (the Estienne School of Graphic Arts and Industries), a graduate of the applied arts and holder of a master’s degree in books as objects.

Founded in 2008, Laurel Parker Book is a workshop dedicated to the bookbinding of artists’ books, presentation objects and conservation objects, where luxury, art and memory come together. Paper and all sorts of noble materials are used to create exceptional gift boxes and unique albums.

Laurel Parker Book has thus become the preferred point of contact for artists, luxury fashion houses, jewellery houses, publishers and museums.

In the summer of 2019, partners Laurel Parker and Paul Chamard took part in a residency at Villa Kujoyama in Kyoto, Japan. As part of this they explored Japanese paper art, and contributed alongside the Japanese artists who initiated the movement to the revival of traditional paper, washi. Their intention was to reinterpret it in the light of French techniques and traditions.

The duo revealed some of their thinking at the Kyoto White Night in October 2019 in the Inner Exterior installation. Because paper is commonly used for partition walls in Japan, the resident artists were able to forge links between public and private spaces.

In November 2019, visitors to the International Art Book Fair in Turin were able to enjoy Laurel Parker Book's testimonial as part of the "Making Books" workshop, a reflection on gesture in art and craftsmanship.

  • 2008

    2008

    Laurel Parker creates her workshop, Laurel Parker Book, in Paris.

  • 2011

    2011

    Paul Chamard joins the workshop as production manager.

  • 2018

    2018

    Laurel Parker becomes a member of the Grands Ateliers de France.

  • 2019

    2019

    Alongside other artists in residence at the Villa Kujoyama, the duo take part in the Kyoto White Night and create an installation at The Terminal gallery.

The Institut français and the project

In 2019, Laurel Parker and Paul Chamard were selected to spend time at the Villa Kujoyama, a residency for artists in Japan supported by the Institut français.

Find out more information about Villa Kujoyama

 

L'institut français, LAB