Bookbindings Old and New

Matthews, Brander

Price: 650.00 USD

New York: Macmillan and Co, 1895. Octavo. 342pp. Design binding. Binding by Leonard Mounteney, who began his binding career with Riviere and Sons in London, worked for R.R. Donnelly in Chicago, and went on to found the Cuneo Fine Binding Studio in Milwaukee. Rebound in 3/4 green leather, with patterned paper sides and leather corners. Beautiful gilt design to spine with red leather inlays. Magenta watered silk flyleaves and doublures. Top edge gauffered; other edges gilt. The leather is unevenly colored, causing a differently colored spine and some discoloration at extremities. Some light shelfwear, an early two-leaf signature is coming loose, and some offsetting to edges of endsheets; otherwise in very good condition. This lovely volume represents a wonderful blend of European fine binding mastery together with modern American design, resulting in an innovative and desirable binding. It is especially nice to see such a fine binding on this classic reference work by Brander Matthews. Very good.