Earth Platinum, the brainchild of Gordon Cheers, published at the end of February in an edition limited to 31 copies, is the world’s largest atlas. The book is 6 feet (1.8 m) high and 4.5 feet (1.4 m) wide. When fully open, it spans 9 feet (2.8 m). It contains 128 pages of maps, flags and panoramic photographs, and weighs over 300 lbs. The atlas can’t be used alone: it takes two people to turn over the enormous pages.
It would have taken one cartographer decades of continuous labor to produce this book. But fortunately publisher Millennium House of Sydney, Australia, had an international team of 88 cartographers at hand to complete the job in just under four years. Earth Platinum was printed in Italy last December and bound in Hong Kong.
All but one of the first edition copies have been sold already. The remaining available copy is on offer at the Altea Gallery in London. But it will set you back $100,000.
Travel Between The Pages 