1867 Les Fleurs Animées | Grandville Bespoke 2-Volume Set

Les Fleurs Animées (The Animated Flowers). Illustrated by J. J. Grandville, and Plate Retouching by Maxime Maubert. Printed by Édouard Blot, Paris, France. Published 1867. French language. 

A two-volume set bound in half blue Morocco leather, I believe as a bespoke order from a 19th-century bookbindery. With five raised bands along each spine, gold gilt linework on the boards, gilt title information and year on spines, top page edges are gold-gilt, yellow, green and red headbands, vibrant marbled boards, octavo-sized volumes, two illustrated frontispieces, fifty hand-colored plates (overview photo for each volume included in photos), two black-and-white botanical index plates, and marbled endpapers. 

In Volume 1, there are clippings from French auction catalogs in the 1960s; they provide fascinating insight into the historical record of these books. 

Les Fleurs Animées is widely regarded as Grandville's crowning achievement; he's a legendary French caricaturist and illustrator known for his fantastical, surreal mashups of humans, animals, and objects.

This specific Garnier pressing is sought after because the original 1847 steel plates were retouched by the natural history painter Maxime Maubert. The coloring is sharper and deeper than earlier printings.

The illustrations in these volumes were carefully retouched for engraving and coloring by Maubert, a respected natural history painter from the famous Jardin des Plantes botanical garden in Paris.

The literary framework was written by a trio of French writers, Alphonse Karr, Taxile Delord, and the Comte Félix. 

I've included photos of some illustrations from both volumes; please let me know if there are any you would like to see that aren't posted. 

200 mm W x 283 mm

Condition:

Volume 1: Some faint marks to leather near the front hinge, some marks to spine, some rubbing to bottom edge of spine and corners, faint discoloration to leather on back board, some foxing throughout pages and flyleaf discoloration, but plates are all vibrant and clean. Very good to excellent condition for its age. 339 pages. 

Volume 2 - Some marks to leather on the front board, light rubbing to spine bands, light rubbing on bottom corners and bottom edge of spine, some foxing throughout pages and flyleaf discoloration, but plates are all vibrant and clean. Very good to excellent condition for its age. 321 pages. 

Please review all photos closely and reach out with any questions or to request additional photographs.