Our Aurelia design is fit for a king. Its inspiration dates back to Paris in the mid-18th century and the original binding housed copies of King Louis XV’s procedures for Holy Week. This book design is a marvellous riot of gold-tooled rococo elements, featuring birds, flowers and leaves.
Our Aurelia design is fit for a king... really! The inspiration for this cover comes from a leather book bound in Paris in 1748 that held copies of King Louis XV’s procedures for Holy Week.
French nobility and their bookbinders were not noted for their restraint in the use of gold embellishment, and this gilt-edged cover is no exception. Originally crafted by Pierre-Paul Dubuisson, this design is a marvellous riot of gold-tooled rococo elements such as birds, flowers and leaves. Dubuisson was himself bookbinding royalty of a sort. He and his father specialized in almanacs decorated with gold plates, and Dubuisson became the King’s official bookbinder in 1758.
Despite Dubuisson’s near-royal stature, this binding was one falsely attributed to Nicolas-Denis Derome le jeune, another celebrated French bookbinder of the era. And like Dubuisson, Derome is no stranger to our Paperblanks collection as it is his medieval “au semé” motif that graces our Parisian Mosaic covers!
This cover, the crème de la crème of French gilt binding, is an ode to the glory of gold – the precious metal against which all others are measured.