Short of inventing yourself a time machine, it’s difficult to picture precisely how England’s cities have changed since Victorian times.
But thanks to the wonder of archive images and a band of roving photographers, the finance company On Stride have created a new set of animated images that instantly transport you back 125 years to the altogether quieter street life of England at the end of the 19th century.
They decided to focus on 7 cities and towns across England:
- Newcastle (Black Gate and Castle)
- Bristol (St Augustine Parade)
- Liverpool (St George’s Hall)
- Scarborough (the Spa at South Bay)
- London (Victoria Embankment)
- Worthing (Marine Parade)
- Manchester (Victoria Street)
This project is part of a series of creative content campaigns produced by On Stride to inspire people in the UK to see their local towns and cities in a whole new light — and hopefully spark enough curiosity in readers to visit these places in person.
On Stride opened a window to the past, with the goal of showing the evolution of England in the last 125 years.
By merging old and new, they created original composite photographs that blend present day with Victorian England.
The colliding architecture, transport, fashion and technology tell a compelling story. They say a picture is worth a thousand words — these past-meets-present images are worth much more than that.
To get this project started, On Stride delved into vintage photographs from the Victorian era that are publicly available as part of the Detroit Publishing Co. collection from the Library of Congress.
For the Newcastle section of the project, two of the city’s most venerable buildings were chosen.
The Black Gate drawbridge post built in 1250, and Henry II’s 842-year-old castle (built on the site of the fortress that gave Newcastle its name) are listed buildings, so they haven’t changed much between Victorian times and now.
The most significant change is the building that’s popped up between them in the photo – and this one’s now listed, too. Built in the classical style as the Northumberland County Hall in 1910 and expanded upwards and outwards in 1933, it is now a hotel. The bridge has become a railway viaduct for the East Coast mainline to Scotland.
Interestingly, the new railway nearly led to the castle’s demolition in Victorian times! Imagine that...
To see the composite then and now images of Newcastle, and the other towns and cities on the list, visit: www.onstride.co.uk/blog/victorian-england-meets-2019
