Grand Monde

With expansive dimensions of 900mm x 1260mm, the Grand Monde format has a vast surface area of 1,134,000 sq mm or 1.134 sq meters. Translating to “Great World”, Grand Monde represents an enlarged double version of the Petit Monde size. Historically, Grand Monde sheets were specially produced at just a few eminent French paper mills to provide a suitably oversized medium for colossal world maps, large illuminated celestial diagrams, nautical navigation charts of oceanic scale and early masterful works of cartographic art when geographic knowledge was rapidly expanding. Although scarce today beyond fine press reproduction for decorative purposes, Grand Monde endures as a relic of daring exploration when the contours of the known world were still being charted. Contemporary map aficionados, historians, collectors and maritime navigation enthusiasts value the format’s magnificence as a symbolic carrier of humanity’s visionary geographic comprehension - back when the first ambitious attempts at capturing the whole world were etched carefully by hand at giant Grand Monde proportion. So its legacy persists as an artifactual tribute to the sweeping global perspectives first revealed on paper.