An Essay On British Cottage Architecture: Being An Attempt to perpetuate to perpetuate on Principle, that peculiar mode of Building, which was originally the effect of Chance

London: Hookham and Carpenter et al., 1798. First edition. Hardcover. Modern quarter brown morocco and marbled boards. Very good. 27 pages in text. 33 x 27 c m. Twenty-one sepia engraved aquatint plates illustrate fourteen designs for rustic retreats, some showing variations of window treatment and surface finishes with the same basic form. MILLARD 42. "Malton had succumbed, deeply, to the influence of Uvalde Price....he was unwilling to accept Dr. Johnson's definition of the cottage as `a mean habitation,' regarding it rather a a hallowed sanctuary......a symbol of a particularly British tradition, to be upheld and preserved at all costs." Malton also made a plea, surprisingly early for preservation, noting, unless protected they will exist "no where but on the canvas of the painter." His designs set the image of the picturesque dwelling that was to survive as the popular ideal in England for a hundred years or more. ABBEY LIFE 34. ARCHER 197.1 "Malton presented this series of 14 designs "to those Nobleman and Gentlemen of taste." COLTON p.535. "These two book [this title and a Collection of Designs for Rural Retreats] establish Malton as a pioneer of the cottage orne." Minor spotting, dampstain to bottom lower corner of most plates are marginal not affecting images, some marginal toning to plates, contemporary owner inscription on half-title dated 1800.