Dubbed "the ultimate book about our world," the luxurious, limited-edition Earth is hand-bound in leather with gilded edges and silver-plated corners, and is attracting attention from buyers around the world.

The atlas and its case together weigh 30kg – or 66lb – which is more than the maximum many airlines set passengers for their baggage allowance.

Priced at £2,000, its 576 pages contain 154 maps and 800 photographs along with detailed descriptions of every country's geography, history and culture.

Ten expert map makers from Global Mapping, based in Manor Road, have spent eight months compiling Earth with a team of more than 100 overseas colleagues, including geographers and oceanographers. They put the new book together using detail from a continuously-updated world database of digital mapping.

Global Mapping managing director Alan Smith said: "We all had to keep to the same, consistent specification to make sure everything tied in universally from the way we shaded hills to presentation of political geography.

"The sheer physical size of the atlas is amazing. The overall content, including the maps, text and photographs, is very much more detailed than any other atlas ever produced."

When closed, the atlas takes up a third of a square metre with four gatefolds opening out to two square metres.
Only 3,000 hand-numbered copies have been made – one for every 3.3 million people in the world.

Earth is the brainchild of Australian map publisher Gordon Cheers, who described it as "a time capsule of where we are in the world today."

Visit the website www.mapstop.co.uk for ordering details and more information.