Bookplate Etching: A Miniature Work of Art

I have blogged about this bookplate from a 1931 gardening book in the past, as well as on an Instagram post shown below. The small shell beside the bookplate shows its actual size. I have more than one book with this bookplate and the one I scanned above did not have the wrinkles in the left margin. I experimented with the scanner on my new printer over the weekend and the scan above shows all the detail in this bookplate. So many bookplates are miniature works of art that are worthy of being enlarged. The engraver was Banks B. Gordon. He was hired by the Etchcraft Company to engrave the steel or copper plate for printing a design that had already been drawn by an artist. I'm not sure whether he was an artist himself and could do custom work directly with the end user of the bookplate.

The book collector with more than one bookplate design to paste in her books was C. A. Maude Eden. See another one I have blogged about with a poem about her love of books, birds, and flowers. xo

Bookplate with Borrowing Instructions

Neither blemish this book nor the leaves double down

Nor lend it to each idle friend in the town:

Return it when read -- or if lost, please supply

Another, as good to the mind and the eye.

With right and with reason you need but be friends

And each book in my study your pleasure attends.

I think these instructions from James Moore are very generous and polite, don't you? I found this photo on my computer, saved from long ago. I added the text below. It has always been my experience when I lent a book that I might as well have kissed it goodbye because I rarely got it back without asking for it. xo

Bookplate: Birds Books Flowers

"No wealthy monarch can possess

 A greater store of golden hours

 Than can be found in happiness

 Of birds and books and flowers"

I bought a collection of antiquarian books years ago and this bookplate was in all the gardening books and this miniature book too. I love the sentiment, don't you?

Wonderful 19th Century Bookplate

How wonderful. I couldn't agree more. I still think about certain books I loaned out and never got back. I remember one in particular and know who has it but it's a book I can live without. When I was very young, I turned down the corners of book pages and then I quit. It still pains me to think about all those times I hurt a book. via

Bookplate with Pig Delivering A Book to Owner

What? The McBurneys must have had a pet pig. Their library looks quite delightful doesn't it? I would love to know more about this pig that brings books. Image found here. Bookplate was designed by William Fowler Hopson

An Apple A Day and A Book

I had a mild case of the flu this week and took care of myself so I am well now. Thank goodness it didn't linger. 

I have posted this bookplate before in a gardening book. This miniature volume is on quotations in foreign languages. The apple is for scale.

No wealthy monarch can possess

A greater store of happiness

Than can be found in happiness

Of birds and books and flowers.

C. A. Maude Eden

Wonderful Early Bookplate

Great early bookplate with a wonderful message for anyone who borrows James Moore's book.

"Note! Neither blemish this book nor the leaves double down. / Nor lend it to each idle friend in the town: / Return it when read -- or if lost please supply / Another, as good to the mind and the eye. / With right and with reason you need but be friends / And each book in my study your pleasure attends."

photo source

A Wonderful Library 1902

Now this is an enviable library. It has everything I need except an ottoman. The big table is really nice for doing research, the easy chair looks comfortable, and the big windows let in nice light plus the wonderful view. What else is there. Robert Hall had wonderful books and wonderful taste! Love.

photo source

Bookplate, 1902. Robert Hall, an avid collector of Kelmscott Press books.

On the library table are Kelmscott works, including William Morris’s The Glittering Plain and his 1895 translation of Beowulf. All the books are clearly bound in the distinctive Kelmscott full limp vellum tied with silk ribbons. The Wood Beyond the World is open to show a Morris-designed woodcut border and frontispiece. Leaning against the bookcase is a copy of the 1896 edition of Chaucer.

Bookplate with Bad Dogs

This is a pretty terrifying image, isn't it? Do you think J. A Kennard had a lot of experiences like this? I certainly hope not! The image is signed by the artist, lower right. 

I can't find the specific blog post, but it's somewhere on Confessions of a Bookplate Junkie.

Black and white etchings

A loose bookplate I found in my stash of old paper. via

I have always loved black and white etchings in thin black frames. via

Can you believe August is over? Boo Hoo.

Lovely Signed Bookplate

I have been fascinated by bookplates forever. They are tiny works of art that reflect the taste of the owner of the book. I love this miniature bucolic landscape with trees and clouds and a garden urn. Found in a 1931 second edition of 'The Scented Garden'. Signed lower right by bookplate artist and designer Bank B. Gordon. Bookplate collectors will know this name. Shell added for interest.

I think the heat wave has broken today. Fingers crossed. My heart goes out to those affected by the flooding in Louisiana. Mother Nature can be very cruel. I am so fortunate to live in a somewhat protected area. I understand we are all in for a very bad hurricane season. Oh dear!

My car has been in the shop for a couple of days in the hands of a new mechanic I discovered. Nothing was wrong with it, but it was time for a tuneup and a once over to get it ready for fall and winter. I even vacuumed it with the shop vac before taking it in. It's going to be ready today. So excited. xo

Charming Bookplate

Detail of the Bookplate on the Thematic Endpapers in an old gardening book. I love the poem.

No wealthy monarch can possess

A greater store of golden hours

Than can be found in happiness

Of birds and books and flowers.

🔹🔹 C. A. Maude Eden 🔹🔹

Book Borrower Warning

Black is the Raven, Black is the rook, But Blacker is the rougue who returns not this book.
A wonderful warning written around 1839 in the front of an 1810 copy of Robinson Crusoe.
Have you ever loaned a book that was never returned? via

1902 Bookplate Ex Libris Robert Hall

Bookplate, 1902. Robert Hall, an avid collector of Kemscott Press books. via

On the library table are Kelmscott works, including William Morris’s The Glittering Plain and his 1895 translation of Beowulf. All the books are clearly bound in the distinctive Kelmscott full limp vellum tied with silk ribbons. The Wood Beyond the World is open to show a Morris-designed woodcut border and frontispiece. Leaning against the bookcase is a copy of the 1896 edition of Chaucer. Click here to see this wonderful bookplate enlarged.

Have a great long weekend. I'm anxiously awaiting the next episode of Orphan Black on BBC America. I missed the first 6 episodes and had to watch them online. When I was up to date I began watching on Saturday nights at 9pm. This will be my third week of watching on the TV set. It is really GOOD. It has been renewed for a second season too. Will you be watching?

Antiquarian Books Still Life

All of my favorite things in one photo that looks like a painting. via

Beautiful Bookplate

Ex-libris by Alphonse Inoue designed for Yoshiki Yamamoto. Alphonse Inoue is the pseudonym of a Japanese artist, known for his sensuous bookplates. via

UK Celebrates Charles Dickens' 200th Birthday

He wrote about life in the modern city, with its lawyers and criminals, bankers and urchins, dreamers and clerks. He created characters still known to millions — Ebeneezer Scrooge and Tiny Tim, Pip and Miss Havisham, Fagin and Oliver Twist. And it made him a star, mobbed by fans on both sides of the Atlantic.

His Bookplate

Prince Charles and his wife Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, joined Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, actor Ralph Fiennes, a host of dignitaries and scores of Dickens' descendants at a memorial service Tuesday (2/7/12) in London. Prince Charles placed a wreath on Dickens' grave in Westminster Abbey's Poet's corner.

Complete story here.

Ex-libris with Swans Circa 1907

From A collection of book plate designs by Louis Rhead, Boston, 1907. via

Encourage the Beautiful

"Encourage the Beautiful, for the Useful encourages Itself." Goethe
From A Collection of Bookplate Designs. Boston 1907: W. Porter Truesdell.

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Wonderful Bookplate

This is great, isn't it?
via