Mary Evans Picture Library

Mary Evans Picture Library is the UK’s leading historical image library with five decades of experience in supplying historical and vintage images to the editorial and design markets. Our own archive consists of hundreds of thousands of pictures from a vast collection of books, magazines, photographs, prints, maps and ephemera, visualising the world as it has changed over the centuries. Whether you are looking for a 1960s fashion photo for a magazine spread, a portrait of Henry VIII for a school textbook, an engraving of dark Victorian streets for a television documentary, or an art deco design for a greetings card, you can find it here. In fact, you won’t find a better selection of images of history anywhere in the UK. The library started in 1964 when Mary and Hilary Evans, enthusiastic and prolific collectors, turned their passion for images into a business. They built an incredible source of pictures, a window on the world gone by, and left a rare and valued legacy. We are a specialist but one for whom history means every kind of visual document from every age. Our collection encompasses photographs; paintings, sculpture and objects; sites of historical interest; prints and woodcuts; illustrations of all kinds; cigarette and trade cards; Victorian scraps; postcards; books and periodicals. The variety of texture gives the researcher a refreshing blend of options and alternatives.