SHAKESPEARE (William). Hamlet. Drama in 5 acts. Translation by Georges Duval. Paris : Auguste Blaizot, René Kieffer, 1913. - In-4, 286 x 196 : 227 pp. illustrated cover. Black chagrin, boards and spine decorated with distinct gold and silver lamé decorations, smooth spine, black chagrin frame inside, decorated with 7 gilt fillets, blue moiré and painted silk lining and endpapers, gilt edges on witnesses, cover and spine preserved, painted calf case (Louise-Denis Germain - René Kieffer) Edition published in the "Collection Éclectique", illustrated with 7 woodcuts and 69 etchings, 5 of which are full-page by Georges BRUYER (1883-1962). Edition at 250 copies on Arches laid paper; one of the 180 containing a state of the etchings. A precious copy in the binding of Louise-Denise Germain (1870-1936). According to Laurence Engel, in her preface to the catalogue devoted to her bindings, published in 2017, "Louise-Denise Germain was able to establish herself as the first female non-bindery artist in the art of bookbinding, a field she was passionate about.» She began with the making of pyrographed and dyed leather objects and it was not until 1904 that she presented her first bindings. She was not a practitioner and entrusted the work of execution to renowned bookbinders such as Chambolle fils, Kauffmann, Stroobants, Canape or, as here, Kieffer, who has affixed his signature. "In fact, for her, the fundamental artistic intervention was the preparation of the covering skin. Whereas, as we know, the decoration of bookbindings (gilding, cold stamping, mosaic, etc.) was always done after the covering, the techniques used by L.-D. Germain are - and this is a major innovation although without posterity - practiced on the raw skin which is then entrusted to the practitioner. The fine gold and silver lamés are the true and immediately recognizable mark of his bindings. (Louise-Denise Germain. Bookbindings. BNF Éditions, 2017, p. 18). The endpapers deserve as much attention as the binding. While at first she used traditional endpapers (moiré or brocaded silk, marbled paper, etc.), from 1922-1923 she adopted endpapers painted with watercolour or gouache, different for each book. This change coincided with the arrival of the painter Joseph Sima in the family circle, who became Louis-Denise Germain's son-in-law in 1923. The financier and art lover Gabriel Thomas (1862-1934) and the politician and bibliophile Louis Barthou (1862-1934) were his two main patrons at the time. Hinges rubbed but solid.