1867 Les Fleurs Animées | Grandville Brown Leather 2-Volume Set

Les Fleurs Animées (The Animated Flowers or the Flowers Personified). Illustrated by J. J. Grandville, and Plate Retouching by Maxime Maubert. Garnier Frères, Paris, France. Published 1867. French language. 

A two-volume set bound in half brown leather, with four raised bands along each spine, gold gilt lettering and floral details on the spines, charming light blue and burgundy marbled boards, blue marbled endpapers, two illustrated frontispieces, fifty hand-colored plates (overview photo for each volume included in photos), and two black-and-white botanical index plates. 

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. 

185 mm W x 275 mm

Condition:

Volume 1: Some marks to leather, some wear to hinges, rubbing to spine bands, edges of spine, and corners; some foxing throughout with heavier foxing from pages 289-303; colored plates are vibrant and mostly clean. Small 13 mm tear on the edge of page 4 (not a colored plate). Good to very good condition for its age. 339 pages. 

Volume 2 - Some marks to leather, some wear to hinges, rubbing to spine bands, edges of spine, and corners; some foxing throughout with heavier foxing from pages 161-176 and pages 193-208; colored plates are vibrant and mostly clean. Small tear on the lower edge of pages 126, 148, and the upper corner of page 158 (not colored plates). Good to very good condition for its age. 324 pages. 

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