Picturing England: The Photographic Collections of Historic England

by Mike Evans, Gary Winter, Anne Grethe Woodward

Photographers have taken pictures of England's buildings and landscapes since the invention of the medium, making images of the traces of past societies as well as photographing the new buildings around them. They have done so for many reasons: to capture the picturesque; to make a living or a souvenir; to promote or to condemn; to record what is disappearing or to reveal what is normally hidden. The formats and types of photograph they have used have been, over time, just as various, from the rare and special image, such as the first calotype, to the ubiquitous digital photograph. Collectively these photographers, both famous and anonymous, have changed the way we see and understand our environment. This book features over 300 striking photographs from the Historic England Archive, an unparalleled collection of 9 million images on England's buildings and landscapes from the 1850s to the present. Viewed collectively, its photographic collections record the changing face of England from the beginning of photography to the present day.

They form a remarkable national asset, a huge memory bank that helps us understand and interpret the past, informs the present and assists with future management and appreciation of the historic environment. With informative essays and captions by the authors, this book will appeal to anyone with an interest in photography, architecture, archaeology or social history.

344 pages, Hardcover

Published June 25, 2015

About the author

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Reviews

[Peter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Update:February 25th 2017
A splendid guide to some amazing streets and buildings of England that no longer exist. This visually stunning guide to architecture and photography from the 1840's to now is a book everyone should have on their shelves.
This was a looong pleasurable read.


Update: December 10th
It's our wedding anniversary today and look what I got.
Wife gave this to me 12 o'clock last night and spent until 2:30 am. reading this, or looking at some of the most remarkable photos from the 1830's onwards.
The picture on the front is from 1933 and five years later it was pulled down to make a new road. There is a picture of Holborn viaduct under construction, 40,000 buildings were demolished to make way for it!
Will add a proper review later, but five stars already speaks loudly enough.


December 4th
HELLO friends. My daughter Natasha is on here so can you all let her know I really, really want this for CHRISTMAS.

JUST LOOK AT THAT GORGEOUS COVER

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent collection of photos, and also a nice and thorough detailed historical account of the development of architectural photography. The last part is particularly interesting to show the serial photos of some sites.