James Lafayette was the pseudonym of James Stack Lauder (1853–1923).
[Anon. (1990).] He was a late
Victorian and
Edwardian
The Edwardian era or Edwardian period of British history spanned the reign of King Edward VII, 1901 to 1910 and is sometimes extended to the start of the First World War. The death of Queen Victoria in January 1901 marked the end of the Victori ...
portrait photographer, and managing director from 1898 to 1923 of a company in
Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...
specializing in society photographs, Lafayette Ltd.
In 1887, he became the first Irish photographer to be granted a
royal warrant.
[Meadows (2004)]
Collections
While thousands of images were credited to Lafayette studios, only those 649 photographs which were registered for copyright bear his signature as author.
These are now held in the
Public Record Office
The Public Record Office (abbreviated as PRO, pronounced as three letters and referred to as ''the'' PRO), Chancery Lane in the City of London, was the guardian of the national archives of the United Kingdom from 1838 until 2003, when it was ...
, in
Kew
Kew () is a district in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames. Its population at the 2011 census was 11,436. Kew is the location of the Royal Botanic Gardens ("Kew Gardens"), now a World Heritage Site, which includes Kew Palace. Kew is a ...
,
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
.
The Lafayette Collection at London's
Victoria & Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...
consists of 3,500 glass plate and celluloid negatives.
[Meadows (1990).] A further collection of 30,000 to 40,000 nitrate negatives is at London's
National Portrait Gallery.
Further collections are in the
Royal Archives
The Royal Archives, also known as the King's Archives, is a division of The Royal Household of the Sovereign of the United Kingdom. It is operationally under the control of the Keeper of the Royal Archives, who is customarily the Private Secre ...
at
Windsor Castle
Windsor Castle is a royal residence at Windsor in the English county of Berkshire. It is strongly associated with the English and succeeding British royal family, and embodies almost a millennium of architectural history.
The original c ...
; and in private hands in
Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...
.
Notes and references
* Anon, 1990. V&A
Brief history of the Lafayette StudioRetrieved: 5 January 2008. London: Victoria & Albert Museum.
* Meadows, Jane. 1990. V&A
James Lafayette biographyRetrieved: 5 January 2008. London: Victoria & Albert Museum.
* Meadows, Jane. 2004. "Lauder, James Stack (1853–1923)", ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography''. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Online editionRetrieved: 6 January 2008.
External links
The Lafayette Negative ArchiveLafayette at the Devonshire House Ball 1897
1853 births
1923 deaths
Irish photographers
{{Europe-photographer-stub