Travel publishers
| By the end of the nineteenth century some of the familiar names in travel guides, including Baedekar and Michelen, begin to capitalise on the market for guidebooks. These samples have been chosen more for what they tell us about their time and audience than for what they tell us about their geographical subject. |
Travel advertisements 
These advertisements inevitably evoke a longing for the past. As we trundle
our luggage through airports, the idea of a servant seems most appealing.
While the grandeur of train stations like Dunedin's meant that accommodation
nearby was the most respectable. Travelling now had high and low seasons,
but travel in this style was still limited to a well-heeled clientele.
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Michelin man
The Michelin man seems slightly thin by comparison with his modern counterpart,
but the insistent endorsement of Michelin products is as modern as any
web-page advertising. At this date, the guides had not yet adopted the
star rating system and did not comment on dining establishments. However,
the company did give the guides away, a new edition each year, to the
extent that 'The Michelin Guides distributed gratis every year would,
if placed one upon another, make a pile 60 times as high as St. Paul's
Cathedral' (2).
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Markino's Rome
Although Markino's image of Rome is at least as romanticised as anything
on display in the beginning of the exhibition, reader expectations have
undoubtedly shifted, developing an interest in the 'personal & local',
the individual experience that softens and colours the scene.
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Pressed flowers
This handbook is included as evidence of other uses to which travel guides
may be put. One can easily imagine a character in A Room with a View placing
a favourite flower into his or her Baedeker. Someone certainly did so
with this volume, though we have not investigated whether this is a Mediterranean
plant.
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Rome
This volume clearly reveals its heritage, in both shape and structure
of its information, but it also enriches it with the benefits of colour
printing and a more vibrant page layout.
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| Michelen man - modern counterpart | |
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