What are the different Canterbury Classics series?

Canterbury Classics produce three main series to entice the budget collector, including the Leatherbound Classics discussed below, as well as their clothbound Illustrated Classics, and their many volumes of flexibound “word cloud” titles.

Are the books covered in ‘real’ leather? 

The leatherbound classics series are bound in decorative ‘bonded’ leather. This is basically a mix of both real leather (leftover scraps and fibres from processing genuine leather) and fake leather (typically a polyurethane binder), rolled together using an adhesive glue and bonded onto a paper backing. So yes, the book covers are comprised of around 20% real leather, and many of the volumes are also textured to give a more realistic leather look.  

What other features do they have?

The books are sized at 6.25″ x 9.25″, and include sewn-in ribbon bookmarks but are mostly printed without illustrations (if you want their illustrated volumes, that’s their Illustrated Classics series). 

The cover designs are stamped in color, often with silver and gold foiled accents and illustrations on both front and back covers. The pages are ivory, the books have illustrated endpapers, the page edges are gilded, and they contain a sewn-in ribbon bookmark. The pages do have sewn signatures but to keep costs down these are often glued into the spine. 

Of note, I think any of the volumes with over around 600 pages is pretty difficult to read – the pages get super thin and the books are hard to hold open in your lap – but to be fair I usually feel that way about omnibus editions.