KIRSCHBAUM, Johann Michael. Neues Weberbild Und Musterbuch

...zur eiden Leinen und Bildweberkunst. [New Weaving Instruction and Pattern Book].
Eckebrecht.: Heilbronn and Rotheburg, 1771.
First edition. Small oblong folio. Bound in modern half morocco over marbled boards. A strong, attractive copy. First printing with additional engraved title page with decorative border. 74 engraved plates (2 in blue, one collates as being upside down and one print is printed in that brick red colour normally referred to as bistre), internally fairly clean with some thumbing and staining to fore-edge margins, obviously a reference book that has actually been referred to, ink stamp of a bookstore in Toledo, Ohio to engraved title page. Further evidence of use comes in the form of copious manuscript annotations (German, and with the look of the mid 19th century) in ink and pencil to pastedowns, the blank versos of a couple of plates and a couple of the text leaves. Possibly lacking a note describing plates 55 and 56. Kirschbaum was a master weaver, and his New Weaving Instruction pattern book was a volume with an extensive and lasting influence upon the world weaving trade. Fancy twills and block pattern woven cloth using Kirschbaum's patterns had, for example, considerable popularity in 19th century Pennsylvania, and weavers apparently found the logical progression of his patterns, gradually increasing in complexity and technical requirements and continually building and combining with each other to be particularly easy to understand and utilise. Considered the last of the great 18th century weavers, carrying on from the earlier contributions to the trade by people like Johann Frickinger, Kirschbaum's book succeeded in carrying the techniques and styles within far into the following century, and his designs are still utilised in cloth making today. Scarce.
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