If Georgia O’Keefe can be called the queen of the flower, then Robert Mapplethorpe is the rightful king. And this is his jubilee year, as 2016 sees a major retrospective of this great photographer’s work shown at dual venues in LA, the LACMA and the Getty Centre, as well as the release of a new Mapplethorpe documentary, a feature film based on Patti Smith’s memoir and this 368-long tome. We love Mapplethorpe Flora: The Complete Flowers, a lavish and sensuous volume that documents Mapplethorpe’s floral studies in both colour and black and white, all held together in a deep-red slipcase.

The flowers are sometimes stark and dramatic – a lone tulip arching to a bend; other times he works more with colour and light – a single gerbera held in a cornflower vase. We love the formality and geometry of his floral portraiture, the perfect accompaniment to Mapplethorpe’s erotic nude portraits. And like O’Keefe, Mapplethorpe makes the flower erotic, petals are labial, stamens are… well… erect.

Our favourite photographs are of Calla Lillies rippling and shown in high-contrast. We want this book on our coffee table so we’ll never be without flowers again.

Mapplethorpe Flora: The Complete Flowers is published by Phaidon.