About Me

My professional life in the bookarts began in 1974 when I was hit by an MTC bus while walking across Riverside Avenue on a rainy afternoon. Taking the remuneration that followed from this encounter, I enrolled in a comprehensive summer course on Calligraphy at the Minnesota College of Arts And Design (MCAD), following (more or less) in the footsteps of my older brother Don, an MCAD Commercial Design graduate. Immersion in things calligraphic grew into a strong interest in things bookbinderly. Books have always been, historically speaking, the primary vehicle for Calligraphy and Illumination; books and writing are what history is --or was.

In 1983, after several years of building modest skills as a handicraft binder, and then some instruction from a visiting London-trained bookbinder, I took the position of Book Conservator of the Special Collections Library at the University of Saint Thomas, in Saint Paul, Minnesota.  After 5-plus years at that institution, and frequent forays for special instruction, workshops, and professional colloquia, I set up another workshop and began a three-year employment as Special Collections Book Conservator (jointly) for Carleton College, and Saint Olaf College (the Kierkegaard Library there), in Northfield Minnesota.

Since 1991 I have worked on my own, out of my home workshop in South Minneapolis, near Minnehaha Falls.  I am busy mostly with book restoration for private, professional, and academic clients. I also accept commissions for custom bindings, box-making, small edition binding, and calligraphy.  I have made a small business of providing  specialty Teflon implements, which I invented, and which have become popular around the world.  I also make and sell hand-cut goose quill pens (the finest writing implement in the world) to the American calligraphic comminity, and other interested parties.

I continue with strong enthusiasm in my persuit of the calligraphic arts, having a special interest in traditional tools and media, especially Gilding (the application of gold leaf, by various means, in manuscript decoration).

The Workshop

click images to enlarge

Located in Minneapolis, Minnesota USA, my workshop is in my home near the Mississippi River. It is a one-man shop that contains several work area, allowing me to tackle a variety of projects at once, such as:

My workshop is filled with fine tools, gathered or made by me during thirty years of work in the craft. Only the finest archival quality materials obtainable from around the world go into my finished pieces. Fine leathers, handmade papers, marbled papers, and imported bookcloth, —to name a few.

From this shop I supply a small line of specialized Teflon tools that have become popular around the world with calligraphers and bookbinders alike. I also supply cut quills that are sold nationwide to the calligraphic community.

Here, too, I do fine calligraphy, an area of interest that I’ve pursued with a special fervor all these years. It was calligraphy that first launched me into the world of bookcraft and beautifully presented text.

  For questions and answers please
  call: 612-729-7165
  write: 4512 31st Ave. S, Minneapolis, MN 55406
  or email:  denny@dennisruud.com