A Pair of Portrait Photographs of a Young Man and Woman, c.1910

Enlarged studio portraits like these hung in many British homes in the years before the First World War. A small studio negative was enlarged onto photographic paper, and the edges were softened into an oval vignette.

The pair show a young man and a young woman, each half-length against a pale ground. He wears a dark jacket, a high white collar and a loosely knotted dark tie. She wears a dark high-necked blouse, small drop earrings and an oval brooch set with a photograph of a young man. Her hair is dressed full and curled, in the fashion of about 1910.

Two photographic enlargements, each on a cream card laid onto a brown mount. Unsigned, with no studio stamp visible. In matching ebonised frames with reeded edges and gilt slips, which suggest the two were framed as a pair. The mount of the man’s portrait has tears at two corners, and fixing pins show through it.