The Map Room

Every map in the house — 52 masterworks, five collections, all centuries out of copyright.

The curated sets

The Four Continents

Blaeu's Americas, Africa, Asia, and Europe — the classic four-map wall of the Golden Age.

4 maps · $390.00

Cartographic Wonders

The map at its most magical — a queen, a lion, the land of love, and a world drawn as a heart.

4 maps · $390.00

N 0° — THE WHOLE EARTH

The Great World Maps

The collection →

1507

The Waldseemüller Map

America's birth certificate.

modified Ptolemaic

1502

The Cantino Planisphere

A state secret, smuggled out of Portugal.

1570

Typus Orbis Terrarum

The world map from the first modern atlas.

1569

Mercator's World Map

The projection that let sailors steer a straight line.

Mercator

17th century

Nova Totius Terrarum Orbis

The Dutch Golden Age at its most magnificent.

double hemisphere

1627

A New and Accurat Map of the World

The great English world map, ringed with wonders.

double hemisphere

1513

The Piri Reis Map

An Ottoman admiral charts the New World.

1652

The World in Figures

costumed figures down all four borders.

double hemisphere

1595

Typus Orbis Terrarum

the cloud-scroll border.

oval

W 74° — LANDFALL

The Continents

The collection →

c. 1617

The Americas

The New World, framed with its cities and peoples.

c. 1617

Africa

The continent, gilded and imagined.

c. 1617

Asia

The road to the riches of the East.

c. 1617

Europe

The old world, at the height of its confidence.

1663

New Holland (Australia)

The first printed glimpse of Australia.

1595

The North Pole

A black magnetic mountain at the top of the world.

1595

Africae Tabula Nova

sea monsters and full-sail ships in both oceans.

regional

E 35° — INTO THE PAST

Mappæ Mundi

The collection →

c. 1300

The Hereford Mappa Mundi

The largest medieval map of the world.

east-up

1375

The Catalan Atlas

The most beautiful map of the Middle Ages.

1154

The Tabula Rogeriana

The world's finest map — drawn upside down.

south-up

c. 1450

The Fra Mauro Map

A monk's crowdsourced world, on the eve of discovery.

south-up

1402

The Kangnido

The Korean map that saw farther than the West.

c. 1200 copy

The Peutinger Table

The road map of the Roman Empire.

1595

The Arctic

the Rupes Nigra, a black magnetic rock at the pole.

polar azimuthal

E 4° — THE DREAM

Cartographic Wonders

The collection →

1537 (later editions)

Europa Regina

Europe as a crowned queen.

west-up

1583 (later editions)

Leo Belgicus

The Low Countries as a rampant lion.

1654

The Carte de Tendre

A map of the country of love.

1531

The Heart-Shaped World

The whole Earth, drawn as a heart.

cordiform (heart-shaped)

c. 1650

California as an Island

The most beautiful mistake in cartography.

1585

Islandia

a dozen lettered sea monsters in the surrounding ocean.

regional

1877

The Octopus

Russia drawn as an octopus, tentacles across Europe.

persuasive

1900

John Bull and His Friends

the octopus returned, twenty-three years on.

persuasive

E 12° — SKYWARD

Cities, Globes & the Heavens

The collection →

1572–1617

Civitates Orbis Terrarum

A great city, seen from the air before flight.

c. 1690s

Coronelli's Globe Gores

A globe, unpeeled and laid flat.

1660

A Celestial Hemisphere

The night sky, as a Baroque masterpiece.

1660

The Southern Sky

the constellation beasts prowling a translucent globe.

stereographic

1730

The Northern Sky

the zodiac band in pink and yellow.

polar stereographic

1660

The Copernican System

the gold sunburst at the centre of everything.

schematic

c.1878

The Port of New York

the Statue of Liberty present in this later state.

bird's-eye view

1687

Orion

the hunter drawn from outside the sphere, and so mirrored.

celestial