100 Books Famous in Typography
Grolier Club Catalog 2021
Typography is an art essential to the book beginning with Gutenberg’s ingenious development of a system for reproducing texts, through new technologies such as hot-metal line casting, phototype and the digitally generated type of today.
An overview of this important art, encompassing its history and study was on display at the Grolier Club with one hundred prime examples May 12-July 31, 2021.1
Jean Grolier (1489/90 – 1565)-Namesake of the Grolier Club
IN THE HISTORY OF BOOKMAKING, no more interesting and brilliant figure is to be found than that of Jean Grolier de Servières, vicomte d'Aguisy. Treasurer-General of France, ambassador to the Court of Rome, and bibliophile. He loved books, not only for what they contained, but what they were. He is one of the first noted private collectors of ornately bound books. He was a patron to binders and the literary arts.
In clothing the masterpieces of literature in sumptuous garments, the impulses of art and literature within him, which were not strong enough for original creation, found an eloquent utterance.2
The Grolier Club of New York City was founded in 1884 by New York printing press manufacturer and book collector, Robert Hoe and eight fellow bibliophiles who met to discuss the formation of a club devoted to the book arts.3 It is located at 47 East 60th Street New York, New York.
The object of the Grolier Club is "to foster the study, collecting, and appreciation of books and works on paper, their art, history, production, and commerce. It shall pursue this mission through the maintenance of a library devoted to all aspects of the book and graphic arts and especially bibliography; through the occasional publication of books designed to illustrate, promote and encourage the book and graphic arts; through exhibitions and educational programs for its members and the general public; and through the maintenance of a Club building for the safekeeping of its property, and otherwise suitable for the purposes of the Club."
Members are an international network of over eight hundred book and print collectors, antiquarian book dealers, librarians, designers, fine printers, binders, and other bibliophiles. The Grolier Club maintains a research library specializing in books, bibliography and bibliophily, printing (especially the history of printing and examples of fine printing), binding, illustration and bookselling. The Grolier Club has one of the more extensive collections of book auction and bookseller catalogs in North America.
Here is the website: One Hundred Books Famous in Typography.
Here is the catalog citation: Kelly Jerry Sebastian Carter and Grolier Club. 2021. One Hundred Books Famous in Typography. New York: Grolier Club.
Summary:"One Hundred Books Famous in Typography, the latest entry in the Grolier Club’s prestigious Grolier Hundred series, is the story of art and technology working in harmony with each other, all the way from Johannes Gutenberg’s ingenious development of a system for reproducing texts through the introduction of newer technologies like hot-metal line casting, phototype, and digital type. Featuring scholarly yet accessible context for the works discussed and their typographical significance, and illustrated with more than two hundred images, Jerry Kelly’s book is the most comprehensive exploration yet of this essential facet of bookmaking and publishing"
History of the Grolier Club. Austin, Gabriel., and Colin T. Eisler. The Library of Jean Grolier; a Preliminary Catalogue. New York: Grolier Club, 1971.
Holzenberg, Eric. Lasting Impressions : the Grolier Club Library. New York: Grolier Club, 2004.
That would be so cool to see!