The volumes in this series are not mere reproductions. They are exact facsimiles of originals held in the Libraries of the British Museum (Natural History) in London and Tring.

............They are not reproductions, because no camera was used in transferring the images from the B.M.(N.H.) originals. Indeed the originals are taken by Museum security courier to the repro-house in Singapore, where they are subjected to the preparation of new plates for printing on 5 and 6 colour offset presses. The paper used is 130 gsm mat art paper. As facsimiles, the books carry faithfully every spot, mark or stain of the originals. They also carry the original Museum Department of Zoology stamps, and librarian's annotations. From behind glass, the naked eye would be unable to distinguish the original from the facsimile, so accurate is the colour printing. Also as facsimiles, they are exactly the same size as the originals (Imperial Folio: 22" x 15"). Each volume is hand sewn, cased-in and bound between 4 mm. boards covered in special Japanese Saifu cloth, gold stamped on the spine, and with the gold Crown Cipher of the British Museum (Natural History) on the front, and blind embossed on the inner margin of the front boards. The end-papers are of special wood-free heavy grade paper, printed in a generated repetitive pattern of the Museum's Library stamps. The publisher has not intruded into the authenticity of the books, leaving the publication data printed only on the very last page at the end of the book block. Each copy is hand inspected by the printer's quality control officer, individually numbered on the inside front board, hand wrapped in protective brown paper, and placed in its own crush-proof outer carton. The carton is then sealed, numbered and signed on the outside by the printer's quality control officer. Thus, no two copies are exactly the same. Although initial volumes were printed in more than 500 copies, later production runs have not exceeded 300 for world-wide sale. This has been caused by a relative shortage of quality paper, together with the intensive hand-labour involved in their production.