Photographers of Great Britain and Ireland 1840 to 1940 their photographs, their studios and their customers

Was your ancestor a photographer? If so, find out more  

The UK’s leading site for dating Victorian portrait photographs. Try our DIY

 Photo Dating Wizard ^[1]  - unique & guaranteed

Get information from the world’s largest collection of British and Irish carte de visite photographs and trade directories. 

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A wonderful family photograph

Extensive information is available on

• 33,000 photographers from the Victorian era and later – up to 1940
• 62,450 studio addresses and dates of operation
• 6,000 customers (the sitters who posed for them)
• 36 fascinating biographies – big families, multiple marriages, financial woes and emigration – as well as the odd jail sentence !
• 3 FREE downloads about various aspects of Victorian photography – with more to follow shortly

The information, much of it unique, is taken from original cartes de visite and cabinet cards in the Victorian Image Collection ^[3] and from trade directories collected over the last 30 years. Data from other sources such as the UK census is also available.

How can we help you?

A small charge is made for some of our services to help maintain the archive of over 200,000 photographs.

• if you want to date a family photograph – click here ^[4]
• if you want to research a photographer in your family tree or see an example of their work – click here ^[5]
• if you want to find a picture of your ancestors – click here ^[6]
• if you want to read some really interesting biographies of photographers – click here ^[7]
• if you want to see images of old photographic studios or examples of photographic ephemera, medals etc. - click here ^[8]
• if you want to sell your old photographs, albums or cameras – click here ^[9]
• if you want to get scanned images for publication or display - click the Victorian Image Collection panel which is on the left

For further information, please contact us ^[10]

Lovely Feedback – the latest

 Hello Ron,  WOW!!!!!

Those pictures are great. I loved the art work and the script of Augustas’ name and design of the back of his pictures which leads me to new searches. Would the backs all been out at the same time or change as the years went by?  I now have art work drawn by my Great, Great grandfather , and also see the people that hopefully he  brought happiness capturing them in his work.

Can’t wait to see the ones coming in the post.  Kind regards and thank you for doing what you do. Wendy P and family – Australia. October 2011