Art & Architecture

Contact Alex Day or Andrea Mazzocchi

Art & Architecture encompasses a broad sweep of material, from early works concerning architecture and architectural history, and books and manuscripts on the fine arts and aesthetics, antiquities and archaeology, to pattern and design books, and private press books and fine bindings. The department also handles original artwork, artistic archives, posters, and propaganda material.

  1. [ANTIQUARIAN]

    Architectural Antiquities from the Sussex Coast.

    [Sussex], July 21st – 10th August 1837.

    An interesting and charming antiquarian manuscript illustrating medieval fonts, gothic windows, brasses, architectural details, and funerary sculptures found in churches along the Sussex coast. The anonymous author/draughtsman gives provenances and historical detail to the drawings, which capture the...

    £950

  2. CARDONNEL, Adam de.

    Picturesque Antiquities of Scotland [I–II] …

    London: Printed for the Author, and sold by Edwards … also by Edwards’s, in Halifax. 1788.

    First edition, the very rare issue with the plates in sepia, printed directly onto thick wove paper.

    £975

  3. [COLOGNE.]

    Hotel de Belle Vue à Deutz vis-à-vis de Cologne tenu pour J.A. Kimmel. [

    Cologne, c. 1850

    A ambitious lithograph advertisement for the Hotel de Belle Vue in Deutz, facing Cologne over the Rhine. The finely engraved view of the hotel shows it with its surrounding park lying on the Rhine which is bustling with barges, there is a bridge crossing the river full of promenading people. The litho...

    £250

  4. [COLONNA, Francesco.] 

    Poliphili hypnerotomachia, ubi humana omnia non nisi somnium esse ostendit, atque obiter plurima scitu...

    Venice, [heirs of Aldus], 1545. 

    Second edition, scarcer than the first (also an Aldine, published in 1499), of the most beautiful illustrated books printed in Italy in the fifteenth century.  Known for its fine woodcut illustrations, mysterious meanings, and the cryptic inclusion of Colonna’s name, the Hypnerotomachia...

    £24000

  5. EBERSOLT, Jean.

    Monuments d’architecture byzantine.

    Paris, Les Editions d’Art et d’Histoire, 1934.

    First edition of this classic account of Byzantine architecture, published posthumously in the series Histoire de l’art byzantin under the direction of Charles Diehl.

    £250

  6. FENTON, Roger.

    Lichfield Cathedral, south transept portal and steps.

    1858.

    A fine print of one of Fenton's most striking architectural photographs, the details of the stonework given human scale, and a touch of mystery, with the figure posed half-in and half-out of the doorway. It was one of a number of images of Lichfield which 'from a restricted distance, move around the...

    £12500

  7. HOWITT, William.

    The rural and domestic life of Germany: with characteristic sketches of its cities and scenery, collected in a...

    London, Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1842

    A fine copy of the first edition of Howitt’s account of his travels in Germany and Austria, and one of the best books in English about German life at the time. Howitt had moved with his family to Heidelberg in 1840 and stayed in Germany for more than two years on account of the education of his older...

    £100

  8. LABORDE, Ernest.

    Vieilles maisons boutiques & paysages de Paris. Eaux fortes originales de Ernest Laborde. Presentées par Gustave...

    Paris, Jules Meynial, 1918 [1919].

    First edition, very rare: two series of twenty etchings each on the most picturesque houses and shops in Paris, produced between 1911 and 1918 by Ernest Laborde (1870–1935).

    £1950

  9. LEWIS, Wyndham.

    The Caliph’s Design. Architects! Where is your Vortex?

    London, The Egoist Ltd., 1919.

    First edition, a pamphlet of art criticism, particularly an attack on ugly modern architecture; there is (rare) praise for Cézanne and Picasso. It was printed in an edition of 1000, of which 121 were distributed gratis and 84 eventually remaindered and returned to Lewis.

    £400

  10. MARLIANI, Bartolomeo. 

    Urbis Romae topographia. 

    Rome, Valerio & Luigi Dorico, September 1544. 

    First illustrated edition (third overall), showing the archaeology and antiquities of Rome as known in the sixteenth century.  First published in octavo by Antonio Blado in 1534 and reprinted at Lyons by Sébastien Gryphe later the same year, Marliani’s topography of Rome remained the foremost...

    £5500

  11. MIDDLETON, Charles.

    Designs for Gates and Rails suitable to Parks, Pleasure Grounds, Balconys &c, also some Design for Trellis...

    London, Published by J. Taylor, at the Architectural Library …, [c. 1805].

    First edition of this charming pattern book of garden designs by Charles Middleton which concentrates on gates, rustic fences and trelliswork. Middleton was a pupil of William Paine, and rather than finding success as a building architect he produced a number of fine architectural pattern books.

    £675

  12. MIGEON, Gaston.

    Les arts musulmans.

    Paris and Brussels, G. van Oest, 1926.

    First edition, published in the series Bibliothèque d’histoire de l’art.

    £85

  13. NORMAND, Alfred Nicolas.

    L’architecture des nations étrangères. Etude sur les principales constructions du parc à l’Exposition...

    Paris, A. Morel, 1870.

    First edition. This is a presentation copy, inscribed on the half-title to the author’s friend Charles Garnier, architect of the Paris opera house that bears his name: ‘A son ami Ch. Garnier. Souvenir affectueux A. Normand’. The two men had known each other since they were both ‘pensionnaires’...

    £4000

  14. OPPENORD, Gilles-Marie.

    Album containing plates from the Grand Oppenord and several rare proof plates.

    Paris, chez Huquier, [c. 1740].

    An interesting album containing plates from the Grand Oppenord, Huquier’s important publication issuing the ornament designs of Oppenord in print. Oppenord (1672-1742) was an important contributor to the development of the rococo style in Europe, adapting Italian baroque ornament to suit French taste....

    £2500

  15. PAPINI, Roberto.

    Le Arti d’Oggi: Architettura e Arti Decorative in Europa.

    Milan and Rome, Bestetti and Tumminelli, 1930.

    First edition of a thorough and extensively illustrated survey of architectural and artistic styles and artworks from across Europe at the beginning of the twentieth century, compiled by the Italian art historian Roberto Papini (1883–1957), director of the Pinacoteca di Brera in Milan and later...

    £300

  16. PARKER, Thomas Netherton.

    Leaves out of the Book of a Country Gentleman.

    Oswestry, W. Price, London, Longman & co., and Shrewsbury, Eddowes & Leake, 1847.

    First and only edition of this very rare compilation by Parker of his farm and estate experiments and inventions, one of one hundred copies privately published, and presented by the author to the Earl of Powis.

    £1950

  17. RAM RAZ. 

    Essay on the Architecture of the Hindús … with forty-eight Plates. 

    London, John William Parker for the Royal Asiatic Society, 1834. 

    First edition, scarce on the market, of this pioneering and handsomely illustrated essay on Indian architecture by the linguist and lawyer Ram Raz (c. 1790–c. 1833). 

    £975

  18. RENGGER, Albrecht.

    Bericht über die Armen-Erziehungs-Anstalt in Hofwyl, im Namen der zu Beaufsichtigung derselben niedergesetzten...

    Tubingen, Cotta, 1815.

    First edition of an account of the agricultural school for poor children founded by Philipp Emanuel von Fellenberg on the estate of Hofwyl in Switzerland in 1799. This is a detailed account of the workings of the school, and its ethos, which was designed to be self supporting and taught children the...

    £180

  19. RICKMAN, Thomas.

    An attempt to discriminate the styles of English architecture from the Conquest to the Reformation with notices...

    London, [1819].

    Second, much enlarged edition, of Rickman’s celebrated investigation into Gothic architecture which was originally published in 1817. ‘This, the first systematic treatise on Gothic architecture in England, soon became well known, and Rickman’s nomenclature was followed by all subsequent writers...

    £275

  20. ROBERTS, Henry.

    The dwellings of the labouring classes, their arrangement and construction, illustrated by a reference to the model...

    London, Society for Improving the Condition of the Labouring Classes, 1850.

    First edition of one of the most important publications on philanthropic housing by the architect and housing reformer Henry Roberts (1803-1876).

    £250