Arcana:

(SEVRES PORCELAIN). Garnier, Edouard. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1891. First American Edition 1/283 Deluxe. 4to. Printed Wrappers. Decorative Arts Monograph. Very Good -.. 32pp + np (8pp), ten printed paper portfolios each containing five 8 ½ x 11 ¾" individual heavy card sheets printed recto only by chromolithography, 250 color illustrations. With an index. This is the 1891 deluxe first American edition of Edouard Garnier's important illustrated survey of the soft porcelain of the Manufacture Nationale de Sèvres. Limited to two hundred and eighty-three numbered copies, this lavish publication consists of two descriptive text booklets accompanied by ten paper portfolios printed by letterpress each housing five beautiful loose chromolithographic plates - most including stunning gold metallic inks to reproduce the use of gilt in the original ceramic works. These reproduce a total of two hundred and fifty watercolour renderings of significant examples of the mark, including numerous pieces from collections belonging to European royalty and nobility. This example contains all fifty plates along with their individual caption sheets and the publisher's hand-numbered limitation sheet (#5/283). The plates and captions show tiny discreet ink numbers at their corners that in no way detract from the images themselves. Fourteen plates exhibit some insignificant to mild foxing to the versos, however due to the thickness of the paper stock on which they have been printed, only three show a minute trace of spotting on the recto. Several of the paper portfolios have very minor wear, age-patination and soiling; with three bearing some brief ink annotations. All in all this is a bright, most handsome, fully-collated copy of this exceedingly uncommon and lovely reference. Inventory Number: 021477