Do you know of any Victorian daylight studios still existing in a recognisable form?

[PetworthPenthouse]

Of the many thousands (I believe that is no exaggeration?) of photographic studios that were established in the UK in the Victorian era, how many have survived to this day in a recognisable form?

As the owner of one such studio, I have been researching this topic, and to my surprise have so far found only about a dozen. The latest updated list can be seen here:

https://www.petworthpenthouse.com/surviving-victorian-photographic-...

Surely there must be more? I'd love to hear from anyone who knows of one.

Also I'd be grateful if anyone could suggest a more accurate figure on how many studios actually were established in the UK in the C19th.

Richard

[PetworthPenthouse]

Yes, now found the Old Photographic Studio Hunt  group on Facebook. And the very useful map of studios (I think no requirement to be a member of the Group to access the map?) here: 

https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1DfRaF4bdu_DvoViLTTw1jQ2h_cz...

Anyone can add the Victorian and Edwardian studios to that map.

Richard

Tony Richards said:

Hi,

The group is called Old Photographic Studio Hunt on Facebook.

Marcel Safier said:

Hi Tony, I've looked and can't find that Facebook group or anything of a similar name. Could you please provide a link? Cheers! Marcel

[Nicholas John Burnett]

Not exactly a studio but there are some darkroom traces still in situ in Linley Sambourne House in London, or were the last time I visited.  In normal circumstances it is open to the public.  Linley Sambourne was a cartoonist for Punch and used photographic studies as a starting point for many of his cartoons. https://www.museumslondon.org/museum/191/18-stafford-terrace-linley...  

[PetworthPenthouse]

Thanks. I visited Linley Sambourne House  good many years ago, but don't remember the darkroom. I now read that his bathroom doubled up as the darkroom.

It's well worth a visit for anyone interested in life as lived by the Victorian cultural set.

[Nicholas John Burnett]

I was giving some conservation advice so had greater access to the various rooms and in consequence was able to see more.

[María de los Santos García Felgu]

We have added two XIXth. Century photographic studios in Portugal (Golega and Funchal, Madeira), both of them very well preserved and open as museums of Photography. 

In Spain most of surviving studios were built on early XXth. Century. Should I include them in the map? 

M. Santos

PetworthPenthouse said:

Thanks Maria, that's interesting.

It would be good to add a pin for each of those studios to this map:

https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1DfRaF4bdu_DvoViLTTw1jQ2h_cz...

(There is a plan to make a different coloured pins for "recognisable", and "disappeared", studios, but I will leave that to the Admin of the Facebook group "Old photographic studio hunt", who has set this map up.)

Meanwhile, I am going to limit my researches to studios in the UK.

Richard

https://www.petworthpenthouse.com/surviving-victorian-photographic-...

María de los Santos García Felgu said:

Thanks a lot for your interest. 

In Spain we have some recognisable daylight studios: two of them still active (both of them in Barcelona, from around 1915-1920), some of them closed (two in Cordoba, as court galleries, from the first years of XXth. century), a big glass gallery (now an apartment) in Madrid.   

The book is sold in the Museo Insular de La Palma (Santa Cruz de la Palma),  [e-mail]