Peter Waters - Biography

Biography

Born in 1930 in Woking, Surrey, England, Peter Waters began his formal education in 1945 at the Guildford College of Art, Surrey, where he studied bookbinding under the instruction of William Matthews. He then went on to study at the Royal College of Art in 1949 and eventually teach at the Farnham School of Art and the Royal College of Art.

While at the Royal College of Art, Waters became a close friend and associate of his tutor Roger Powell, a well known preservationist and bookbinder whose work includes the 1953 restoration of The Book of Kells. At the RCA, Waters also met his future wife, Sheila, who was soon to become one of the foremost calligraphers and map designers in the world. In 1957 Peter Waters and Roger Powell formed a professional partnership in book binding and conservation at the bindery in Hampshire. They produced many acclaimed designer bindings for museums and collectors, often aided by Sheila who made many drawings and designs for stamping engravings. Powell and Waters were called upon to restore many rare books, including The Book of Durrow, the Books of Dimma and Armagh, and the Lichfield Gospels. Waters eventually took over Powell's position at the Royal College of Art and remained there until he and his family moved to the United States in 1971. A DVD entitled "Peter Waters, Master Bookbinder" has been produced featuring his early bindings from student days to the mid-1960s, prior to the Florence flood.

In 1971, Waters was appointed the Conservation Officer and Chief of the Conservation Division at the United States Library of Congress in Washington, DC. Under Waters' supervision, a new conservation lab was created so as to allow for the restoration of many of the items found in the Library of Congress's huge collection of library materials, artifacts and cultural archives.

Waters remained at the Library of Congress until 1995 when he retired, although he remained an active member of the conservation community and served on the National Archives Preservation Committee and was a fellow of the International Institute for Conservation and the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works.

Waters died on June 26, 2003 of mesothelioma-related heart failure. His exposure to asbestos dust while using bookbinding tools in the mid-1900s is responsible for his development of this form of cancer.