Antique Prints

If you have a taste for fine art, but don't have the budget to match, antique prints are a practical and fun thing to collect.  The older prints are hand-colored, so they have a very human quality, and the natural fading and yellowing of the paper gives them a great patina.  And did I mention you can get them for a song?  

I remember reading that when Jackie Kennedy Onassis's estate was sold at auction at Sotheby's in 1996, one surprise was the dearth of original art.  She had mostly collected prints. Here is a photo from the auction catalog of her Park Avenue apartment.

via Habitually Chic

The first antique prints I bought were several James Sowerby botanicals that I found in an antiques store, and they hang on our bedroom walls.  Here is a print by Sowerby of Feverfew that is similar to the ones I own:

Printed in 1791, it's for sale on Panteek.com for $25.  Not a bad price for an 18th century antique.  There is no question our prints are the oldest things in our house.  

Panteek also has an eBay store, and if you are lucky, you can get prints there for even lower prices than on their website.  I have many that I bought from them on eBay for under ten dollars, because there were no other bidders.  They do a beautiful job of packaging the prints, and sending you copies of the title pages of the antique books out of which most prints are taken.  All of the prints below are for sale on their website.

This adorable little hummingbird print is as tiny as its subject.  The paper measures four by six inches.  Perfect for a powder room full of itty bitty curiosities.  It's a 1833 Jardine print for $45.

Here's a pretty John Ellis Coral print, published in 1786.  $165.

These egg prints seem to be everywhere I look.  The colors are wonderful, and they look right up to date, so I can see why.  1867 Morris egg print.  $29.

I love these Johann Weinmann 1737 prints for their boldness and scale.  These are large: nearly ten by fifteen inches.  This one of a horse chestnut is $245.  Everything about horse chestnut trees is beautiful: their form, their leaves, their flowers, their pods, and of course, the shiny brown horse chestnuts themselves.  Sometimes I daydream about a whole room of comfy furniture slipcovered in Rose Cumming's Chestnut Leaves  chintz, below.

But I digress...

Here is another from the Weinmann series.  How great would this look in a kitchen over a breakfast table?  I love the combination of olive green and burnt orange.  $395.

I'm sorely tempted by these 1912 French fashion prints, especially these shooting outfits.  My husband is a serious bird hunter, so to me, these are a hoot.  $165 each.

I could spend hours on Panteek's site.  I'll try to restrain myself to just one more favorite ... this 1815 Turpin print of an oak for $35: