New Old Ways: Continuing the Legacy of Jim Croft Through Land-based Book Arts Classes

"And there is the pleasure of doing something different, something so old that it is new again." – Elizabeth Wayland Barber

Legendary book arts figure Jim Croft passed away last fall. For over 50 years, he lived off grid and researched, recreated and taught old world methods of toolmaking, papermaking, and bookbinding.

With his passing, the book arts community has also lost the magical ‘Old Ways’ classes he and his partner Melody offered out on their property in Northern Idaho. Old Ways was singular opportunity for students to gain a deep understanding of where their materials come from as they learned how to transform fiber, wood, bone and hides into finished tools, paper, and books. Often, the students would leave the Old Ways experience transformed themselves.

We (Mary Sullivan and Brien Beidler) are asking for your support to help us launch New Old Ways, or NOW. With Jim’s blessing and the support of his family, we plan to begin offering classes near where Brien lives in Northwest Georgia, possibly as early as 2028. While our core focus will center on maintaining the original Old Ways curriculum and ethos, we have many ideas on other book arts classes we want to offer that will build upon this foundation.

The money we are asking for will be used to purchase tools and materials for the workshop. Chiefly, we are looking to acquire many of the raw materials that Jim spent countless hours procuring and processing over the years, most notably his wood for covers, moose, elk, and deer bone for tools, and fiber for paper and thread. We plan to draw from this stock early on so that we can begin processing and curing our own stock for future workshops. We also want to make sure that these primo materials are made available to the wider book arts community so that they can be used on beautiful books as Jim intended.

Some of the money will also go towards kitting out the workshop so that students will all have all the shared and individual tooling they need during the workshop, as well as towards a beater for papermaking.

We are doing what we can to ensure that future generations of bookbinders, conservators, and artists will continue to have the opportunity to learn the techniques that Jim shared with each of us over the decade and a half we both worked with him. We also plan to make sure everyone will have a hell of a lot of fun while doing it!

Thank you for your support, and please help spread the word!

"It has to start somewhere / It has to start sometime / What better place than here? / What better time than NOW?" – Rage Against the Machine