A rooster in a herringbone overcoat arriving at a Mayfair studio on a winter morning

Behind the Lens

A Morning in Mayfair

20 January 2026

Most sittings begin the night before, in the quiet negotiation between what was promised and what might actually be possible. This one began at dawn.

Featuring Aldous, Whitmore

Reviewing contact sheets at a desk surrounded by film canisters and a steaming cup of coffee
A rooster perched on a stepladder in a Georgian studio with large windows and photography equipment

Thirty-seven frames from the Devereaux sitting. Three worth printing. The ratio has never troubled him.

The stepladder is not in the brief. It is never in the brief.

A dark-feathered rooster in an embroidered velvet jacket, posed on a wooden stool before a large-format camera

Lord Ashburton had requested 'something timeless.' He got seventeen minutes and a stool with one short leg.

The photographer reviewing rooster portraits on a monitor in a dark editing suite
An empty studio flooded with midday light, camera on tripod, desk with scattered papers and cold tea

Between sittings, the real work. The selection is always more painful than the shoot.

By noon the studio belongs to the light again. The work is somewhere in the post.