Growing a collection...

I have just begun building a complete, fine collection of the Scribner's Illustrated Classics series. They are wonderfully illustrated (Wyeth, Parrish, Pyle, etc) juvenile fiction and lovely to look at. Interestingly, there appears to be no "official" bibliography of this series...surprising given the overall popularity of the volumes (originally published in the 1910s and 20s, they remain in print today). In all, there are somewhere around 20 volumes (I'll update this when I come to a firm sense of all that exist).

Too many people end up overwhelmed by the scope of what they want to collect (e.g. "westerns" or "southern fiction"). I think it is so much better to drill down on that which really engages you. Build a small collection of near pristine Scribner's Classics...then add everything illustrated by NC Wyeth (also a smallish, though in some cases, pricey collection). When you get the Wyeth where you what it, you broaden to Pyle and so on. What you end up with is a vibrant, organic collection that is bound together in interesting ways.

I've seen similar growth in many private collections and they are so much more engaging than a very broad, but thin, library.