Gardens: A history.

WARNING: This blog post has a lot of cool images! Rösel von Rosenhof, August Johann et al. Historia naturalis ranarum nostratium: in qua omnes earum proprietates, praesertim quae ad generationem ipsarum pertinent, fusius ennarrantur. Nürnberg: gedrucht bey Johann Joseph Fleischmann, 1758. Print. – Frontispiece.  “Humans have long turned to gardens—both real and imaginary—for sanctuary from…

The Floating World of Edo Japan

When exploring the Sutro Library’s rare collections, one notices that Japan’s Edo Period is well represented amongst the stacks. Hundreds of ukiyo-e (a genre of woodblock prints and paintings) images join travel narratives and thousands of photographs to tell the story of Japanese art and culture from 1603 through 1868 known as the Edo or…