Extraordinary Copy in Original Boards
Observations on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening. Including Some Remarks on Grecian and Gothic Architecture.
London: Printed by T. Bensley for J. Taylor, 1803.
Price: $15,000.00
About the item
First edition. 16, 222, [2]pp. Stipple-engraved portrait of the author by W. Holl after S. Shelley and 27 engraved or aquatint plates (including 12 hand-coloured, 12 with overslips, 1 folding, 1 double-page), numerous engraved, wood-engraved or aquatint vignettes and illustrations (including 2 with overslips). Uncut. 1 vols. 4to (14 x 11-3/8 inches). Extraordinary Copy in Original Boards. Original pink paper boards, upper board lettered and with a wide Greek key border, expertly rebacked and retipped to style. Repair at fore-edge of the frontispiece portrait. Abbey Scenery 390; Tooley, p. 209; Henrey I, p. 546.
Item #322249
Rejecting the formalism of his predecessor Lancelot Brown, Repton adopted a more natural and varied style of ornamentation which has been described as combining “artistical knowledge...with good taste and good sense.” Compiled chiefly from the his Red Books -- bespoke manuscript productions produced for each client with watercolor drawings of the ground with his proposed altertations as overalys -- and illustrated with facsimiles of his original sketches, Repton's Observations is important as a record of his work and his views as a landscape gardener. No man did more to change the shape of the English countryside.
Extraordinarily rare in the original boards.
