Botany Illustrated

Hardcover. Rochester, Chase Brothers Company, 1st, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Flexible tan cloth covers, 134 pages. Illustrated with beautiful, bright, full color illustrations and blow-in sheets of flowers and fruit. A fine, bright copy. No date but appears to be early 1900s.

Hardcover. San Francisco, Pomegranate, 1st, 2017, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 124 pages. MF Cardamone creates artwork that harks back to centuries past but is deeply rooted in the present. Her cultural and sociological commentary, delivered in words and images, reveals her sly sense of humor and love of all things botanical. An artist fluent in various media, including painting, sculpture, and limited-edition clothing, Cardamone discovered her passion for plants when she restored a garden at her seventy-five-year old farmhouse near Philadelphia. She enrolled in the Barnes Foundation Arboretum School and learned to collect specimens and create herbarium sheets, documenting the many medicinal uses of plants along with their history and landscaping potential. She picked up old books of botanical illustration, and herbals from a time when a pharmacist might prescribe a homemade tea to cure whatever ailed you. When her studies expanded to medical QiGong and Hatha yoga, her artwork took on a spiritual dimension. Cardamone begins with a plant specimen and watercolor paper, then turns to gouache, pen and ink, and digital imagery. She balances the scientific aspect of her work with a large dose of humor in the selection and placement of cultural icons from the plant's home environment. 

Hardcover. London, Merrell Holberton/Natural History Museum, 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 128 pages, 62 color plates, 33 b&w illustrations. A detailed monograph on this early 19th century natural history artist. In publisher's shrinkwrap.

Hardcover. London, J. Davis, 1st, 1791, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 22 (of 24) hand-colored plates proceeded by 22 pages of description. Bound in marbled boards with a linen spine and spine label. Missing plates 13 and 19. The flowering plant illustrations, executed by James Sowerby, are all bright and clean. Original blue-gray wrappers bound-in. First issued in 1792 (despite title page date of 1791, preface is dated May 1792). Previous owner's note (tipped onto front fly leaf and dated 1936) states this copy came from the Czar's Hermitage Library. No way to confirm this as there is no label or Double Eagle stamp.

Hardcover. London, Wordsworth, 1st, 1990, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 342 pages. Hardcover with dust jacket. Illustrated with full color paintings by P.J. Redoute. Clean, tight copy.

Hardcover. London, Longman, Brown, Green and Longmans, reprint, 1849, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, 284 pages, illustrated with 24 brilliant color plates including the frontispiece. Original green cloth with gilt decorated front cover, gilt design on spine, top edge gilt. Covers with light edge wear, chipping to top of spine. Title page states New Edition, so assumed a reprint. The plates do not appear to be hand-colored but chromolithographs, all brilliantly colored and except for the frontispiece (which has a touch of foxing) all are clean and unblemished. Previous owner's signature on front fly leaf.

Hardcover. NY, McGraw Hill, 2nd pr., 1974, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover. A history of illustrated flower books with a description of the various types. Handsome folio volume, 11" by 14.5". Olive green silk cloth binding, bright gilt spine titles, blindstamped flower design to front cover. 208 pages with bibliography and index. 126 illustrations, including 40 full page color plates taken from rare printed books. The period 1485 to 1850 is covered, after which standards of reproduction began to decline. There is a small crease which runs down the center of the dj font panel, but not conspicuous. clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1st US, 1965, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn dust jacket, 231 pages, richly illustrated, primarily in color. This book is filled with gorgeous color illustrations. 1486 species illustrated, nomenclature edited by Douglas Kent. Clean copy.

Hardcover. New York, G.H. Buek, 1st, 1894, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, oblong light beige cloth with gilt title and decoration. Non-Paginated. Illustrated with 288 clean full color plates. Front and rear hinges cracked but holding with spine cloth. Light wear to covers. Originally published in parts as a Botanical Fine Art Weekly publication.