Adolf Bähr & Co. (attributed)
The Favourite Picture Book (Pop-Up Book - Number 2 in the series)
Berlin: Adolf Bähr & Co., [ca. 1911]. First edition.
Oblong folio (34 x 21 cm). [12] unnumbered pages, chromolithographed throughout. Six elaborate double-page tissue honeycomb pop-up scenes. Original color pictorial glazed boards, spine perished, text block intact. Printed in Germany. D.R.G.M. 247833 and D.R.P. angem. markings to cover. Text in English.
An exceptional and exceedingly scarce example of early 20th-century German paper engineering, this stunning pop-up book features six spectacular spiral-cut honeycomb tissue constructions. When opened, each spread reveals an intricately layered three-dimensional scene, visible through a circular aperture that lifts from the page. These early honeycomb techniques reflect a transitional moment in movable book history, where German ingenuity merged toy construction with narrative illustration.
The cover of The Favourite Picture Book – Volume 2 features a striking chromolithograph of an elaborately adorned elephant carrying a group of children in a decorated howdah, led by a turbaned mahout holding a staff. The dramatic head-on perspective emphasizes the elephant’s ornate trappings, including a red and gold headdress with crescent emblem, tasseled fringe, and a large parasol. Behind the mahout, Edwardian-era children wave their hats in excitement, evoking a sense of adventure and spectacle. Markings along the lower edge—“Printed in Germany,” “D.R.G.M. 247833,” and “D.R.P. angem.”
Scene 1 - A vivid chromolithograph of a large butterfly dominates the first scene, with its vibrant yellow wings edged in black and accented by bold red and blue eye spots. The center of the butterfly is formed by a striking three-dimensional honeycomb paper structure in warm orange and green hues, which expands as the page is opened
Scene 2 - A richly costumed elephant parade takes center stage in this honeycomb pop-up scene, set before a fantastical palace with onion-domed towers. Atop the elephant, a vibrant three-tiered honeycomb structure in yellow, red, and green forms a lavish howdah (riding canopy) that bursts into dimension as the page opens. Inside the structure, finely dressed children ride regally. Below, a turbaned mahout guides the elephant with a rod, while bystanders—including a girl in bonnet and sash—look on in awe.
Scene 3 - A brilliantly colored parrot springs forward from the page in a striking three-dimensional honeycomb form, its plumage rendered in vibrant red, gold, and cobalt hues. Suspended from two curved poles, the parrot performs a trained trick, gripping a perch with metallic rings. Below, a black poodle balances on hind legs while another exotic bird flutters nearby. Two women in Edwardian dress look on from the path, parasol in hand, evoking a genteel afternoon at a Victorian animal show or pleasure park.
Scene 4 - A vibrant pink honeycomb structure in the form of a tall bird feeder or ornamental post rises dramatically from the center, anchoring a lively rural barnyard scene. Surrounding the pop-up are flocks of doves, ducks, and pigeons in motion, suggesting a feeding frenzy. A young girl in a straw hat scatters grain from a basket as animals—rabbits, turkeys, geese, and even a piglet—emerge from the cottage and gather near the base. The illustrated backdrop includes a thatched-roof farmhouse, a church steeple, and distant hills.
Scene 5 - A large white stork with vivid red legs dominates the foreground, its body formed by a textured beige honeycomb that creates dimensional volume across the center spread. The stork holds a frog in its beak, mid-stride through a shallow lily-covered pond. Yellow waterlilies and reeds frame the water scene, while tiny ducklings paddle among the lily pads. In the background, two children sit on a grassy bank with a butterfly net, observing the action.
Scene 6 - This vibrant barnyard tableau features a proud rooster and hen at the center, each adorned with a rainbow-colored honeycomb pop-up body. Surrounding them, a flurry of fluffy yellow chicks peck at the ground, splash in a shallow water dish, and waddle among scattered eggshells.
Condition:
All six pop-ups are complete, original, and entirely free from tears—a remarkable survival given the fragility of the materials. The binding is intact, though the spine shows significant wear. Modern archival (non-staining) tape has been discreetly applied to reinforce several internal hinges. Boards show moderate edgewear and minor abrasions consistent with age. Please consult the provided photographs for details.
Rarity Note: This double-honeycomb poultry scene is part of The Favourite Picture Book (Volume 2, ca. 1911), an extremely rare early 20th-century German novelty. No institutional holdings or known references document this particular volume or its contents. The twin pop-up construction seen here is especially uncommon among surviving honeycomb books, and its complexity—both in engineering and vibrant color—suggests a higher level of production effort than typically found.
Collector’s Corner:
The publisher of these books has long been a mystery. Through diligent research and help from Florian Preiß, Librarian for The German Museum of Masterpieces of Science and Technology (AdöR) in Munich, we were finally able to unravel the mystery. The registration number was filed with the Adolf Bähr company, Berlin. Below you will find a patent ad for his honeycomb with an image that matches his parrot "pop-up". How fitting that Bähr used a bear as his logo — the German word for bear is Bähren, echoing his name, and the bear is also the proud symbol of Berlin.
This edition is one of three known books in a likely series, all sharing the same registered utility model number, D.R.G.M. 247833, and the distinctive bear-in-circle logo attributed to Adolf Bähr & Co. However, only the second and third titles bear the additional designation “D.R.P. angem.” on their covers; this first title carries the D.R.G.M. marking alone.
The three titles in the sequence are:
The Favourite Picture Book – Cover: Boy holding a book (D.R.G.M. 247833) – People scenes
The Favourite Picture Book – Cover: People riding an elephant (D.R.G.M. 247833) – Animal scenes [THIS COPY]
[Untitled] – Cover: Clown and ducks (D.R.G.M. 247833) – Circus scenes
All three of these books were acquired by VintagePopupBooks.com, with the second and third titles being previously undocumented.
The specific DRGM number 247833 was issued in 1911, confirming the probable publication date for this copy. The related D.R.P. ("Deutsches Reichspatent") designation further links this book to a 1905 German patent (No. 166117) filed by Adolf Bähr & Co., which describes a spiral-formed honeycomb structure designed for movable picture books.
The publisher’s logo—a standing bear enclosed in a circle—appears consistently across all three known books and matches the registered mark of Adolf Bähr & Co., which held patents in Germany, Austria, and the United Kingdom for honeycomb-based three-dimensional constructions.
Estimated publication date rationale: Although the underlying honeycomb mechanism was patented in 1905 (German Patent No. 166117), the book was likely not published until several years later. This delay is typical for complex novelty formats, as translating a new mechanical patent into a commercially viable children’s book required further design refinement, prototype development, registration, and coordination with lithographers and binders. The specific construction used here corresponds to DRGM 247833, a utility model registration issued around 1910–1911. The visual style, chromolithography, and paper engineering techniques are also consistent with high-end German novelty books produced in the early 1910s. Taken together, these factors support an estimated publication date of circa 1911.
An advertisement for the invention, showing the matching parrot scene, appears in Extracts from the Patent Specifications, Volume 27, p. 348 (1906):
In the 1905 patent above, Baehr emphasizes the educational value of supplementing flat illustrations with three dimensional forms. In this example, those forms are constructed of delicate gummed tissue paper folded in a collapsible honeycomb structure. Baehr explains that the goal of such picture books is to train a child’s powers of observation by presenting everyday objects and processes in a way that is both visually realistic and easily grasped. By adding three-dimensional forms to otherwise static illustrations, the invention aims to deepen the child’s comprehension and receptiveness, fulfilling the educational role of picture books more effectively than conventional formats.
References
"DRGM Numbers with Year Ranges." Porcelain Marks & More: Germany. Accessed July 12, 2025. https://www.porcelainmarksandmore.com/resources/dates/drgm.php
— Offers a date index linking specific D.R.G.M. numbers to their registration years, confirming 1911 for 247833.
German Patent and Trade Mark Office. “History of the DPMA.” DPMA.de. Accessed July 13, 2025. https://www.dpma.de/english/our_office/about_us/history/index.html
— Provides historical context for Germany’s patent systems, including D.R.G.M. and D.R.P., from 1877 through WWII.
Archiving Industry. New Markings on Vintage Industrial Items: Endnotes. Accessed July 13, 2025. https://archivingindustry.com/Industrydata/archivingindustrynewmarkings-endnotes.pdf
— Explains the meaning of “D.R.P. angem.” as Deutsches Reichs-Patent angemeldet, or “patent pending,” and its relevance as a dating indicator.
Porcelain Marks & More: Germany. “Glossary of German Markings.” Accessed July 13, 2025. https://www.porcelainmarksandmore.com
— Clarifies definitions and distinctions between D.R.P., D.R.G.M., and related registration marks found on early German products.
Baehr, Adolf, and Theodor Sernau. Picture Book with Representations of Objects in Model. GB Patent 190520649A, filed October 12, 1905, and published August 9, 1906. Espacenet. https://worldwide.espacenet.com/patent/search/family/032186602/publication/GB190520649A
About the Publisher: Adolf Bähr & Co.
Adolf Bähr (1875–1943) was a German-Jewish inventor and manufacturer who played a pioneering role in the development of honeycomb-folded pop-up books and other mechanical paper novelties during the early 20th century. Born on January 25, 1875, in Deuben near Dresden, Bähr established himself as an innovator in both decorative hardware and paper engineering. His firm, Adolf Bähr & Co., operated out of Deuben–Dresden and later expanded to multiple locations in Berlin. Through a combination of design patents, educational publishing concepts, and consumer goods, Bähr helped define the mechanical novelty landscape in Germany during a period of industrial and artistic transformation..
Trade directories from the late 19th century list Bähr’s Dresden-area firm as a manufacturer specializing in fittings for cardboard packaging, majolica and glassware, tin toys, and modern photograph frames. An 1886 entry in the Adressbuch aller Länder der Erde describes his firm in Deuben–Dresden as producing "Beschläge für Cartonnagen, Majolika- u. Glaswaren, Blechspielwaren, Spez.: Blechsoldaten" (fittings for cartons, majolica and glassware, tin toys, especially tin soldiers). These listings show Bähr as a craftsman and manufacturer working across the boundaries of decorative arts, packaging, and toy production—fields that would soon converge with his later inventions.
By the early 1900s, Bähr had extended operations to Berlin. A 1905 British patent lists the firm Adolf Baehr & Co. at No. 12 Siemensstraße, Berlin N.W. 87, where he and partner Theodor Sernau filed a patent titled “Picture Book with Representations of Objects in Model.” The invention described a novel picture book in which facing pages conceal collapsible sheets of gummed paper folded in a honeycomb pattern. When the pages are opened, these paper structures expand into three-dimensional models that enhance the flat printed illustrations.
A second patent from the same period (DRP No. 263427) describes a collapsible figure with swinging limbs and a body formed of honeycomb-glued paper—an invention reflecting Bähr’s continued exploration of movable paper mechanics. These inventions placed him at the forefront of mechanical novelty design, integrating educational, artistic, and engineering principles into movable media.
By 1921, the firm’s Berlin address had changed to Ritterstraße 82, Berlin S.W., as shown in an advertisement published in Das Echo: Mit Beiblatt Deutsche Export Revue. This ad promoted the “Wie Du willst – Patent Steh- & Hänge Spiegel,” a patented adjustable mirror sold by Adolf Baehr & Co. and featured at the Leipzig Trade Fair in Specks Hof. The transition from Siemensstraße to Ritterstraße indicates either a relocation or expansion of business operations between 1905 and 1921, and shows that the firm remained active in the patented novelty goods sector for at least two decades.
Adolf Bähr’s business portfolio—ranging from educational pop-up books and collapsible novelty figures to mechanical household items like mirrors—reflects a consistent focus on paper-based engineering and patent-protected innovations. His work bridged traditional decorative manufacturing and early modern industrial design.
As a Jewish businessman living under the Nazi regime, Bähr became a victim of persecution during the Holocaust. He was deported from Dresden to the Theresienstadt concentration camp on January 20, 1943, and died there on June 3, 1943, at the age of 68. His name is recorded in both the Gedenkbuch of the German Federal Archives and the Holocaust Survivors and Victims Database of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. No records of his company’s survival after his death have been found.
Adolf Bähr’s technical contributions—especially his advancement of three-dimensional honeycomb pop-up book mechanisms—remain an important part of early movable book history and paper engineering.
References:
German Federal Archives Gedenkbuch: Adolf Bähr. https://www.bundesarchiv.de/gedenkbuch/en1047164
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM), Source ID 49492. https://www.ushmm.org/online/hsv/source_view.php?...
English-language patent: “Picture Book with Representations of Objects in Model,” Adolf Baehr & Co. of No. 12, Siemensstraße, Berlin N.W. 87, 1905
German Patent No. 166117, Class 11d (7 March 1905)
DRGM collapsible figure patent (1905), listed in Deutsche Reichs-Patentblatt
Adressbuch aller Länder der Erde, 1886, p. 734 (Adolf Bähr in Deuben–Dresden)
Trade advertisement for “Wie Du willst – Patent Steh- & Hänge Spiegel,” Das Echo: Mit Beiblatt Deutsche Export Revue, 1921, p. 2769
Berlin Adressbuch entries (matching Ritterstraße and Siemensstraße addresses)
FürthWiki and US toy history databases (used for comparative exclusion of unrelated individuals)
For photos and further comparative analysis, see our listings under the “Books for Sale” section or the “Virtual Museum” archive at VintagePopupBooks.com.
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