This is what was on it.
Five shelves of the locked case.
Belle Époque erotica illustration
The Illustrated Hour
1890s–1930
Desire drawn with a couturier’s line.
The risqué magazine register
La Vie Parisienne
1900–1930
The tease that came in the post, every week.
Shunga — the mainstream Edo art it was
The Floating World After Dark
1810s–1830s
The locked drawer and the open shelf were one world.
Burlesque & music-hall ephemera
The Cabaret
1890s–1930
The tease in print — the poster outside the door.
French-postcard photography
The Postcard Drawer
1900s–1920s
Anonymous, and framed as history.
Enter the Gallery →
The whole case, filtered by collection, grade, medium, and era.
The Private Case
Every great library has a locked shelf.
Museum-grade reproductions of what the print room kept behind a closed door — scholarship with the lights low.
Scroll to unlock ↓
The register
Curatorial, adult, unembarrassed — never leering.
The Private Case reproduces vintage risqué and erotic art published through 1930 — Belle Époque illustration, the risqué weeklies, shunga presented as the mainstream Edo art it was, cabaret ephemera, and, sparingly, period photography. Every piece is public domain, and every piece — illustration and photograph alike — passes a logged human review for age certainty and dignity before it is shown.
The Collections
Belle Époque erotica illustration
The Illustrated Hour
1890s–1930
The crown of the shelf. Gerda Wegener’s rococo lovers, the acid wit of Félicien Rops, Achille Devéria’s lithographs — the salon’s polish brought to the locked drawer. Von Bayros appears only where the universal gate passes; where it does not, the plate simply isn’t here.
The risqué magazine register
La Vie Parisienne
1900–1930
The pre-1931 covers and interior plates of the great illustrated weekly — Chéri Hérouard’s pre-1931 work at its centre. Suggestive, never nude: this is the apparel engine of the house, the register that becomes a poster you can wear.
Shunga — the mainstream Edo art it was
The Floating World After Dark
1810s–1830s
Shunga by the same masters and houses that made the landscapes — Hokusai, Utamaro — presented as the mainstream publishing it was, not an underground. The explicit register is cataloged for the record and vaulted; it has no publish path at launch.
Burlesque & music-hall ephemera
The Cabaret
1890s–1930
Programme covers, music-hall bills, the graphic ephemera of the tease. The register that sold the ticket, not the act. Suggestive throughout, and the second home of the apparel line.
French-postcard photography
The Postcard Drawer
1900s–1920s
The French postcard, curated sparingly under the dignity doctrine. The subjects are real, anonymous women who never imagined this commerce — so every piece here is anonymous, honestly restored, and carries its era-framing. Wall art only; never apparel.