These stunning postcards of France during the turn of the century were created using Photochrom, a process for producing colorized images from a single black-and-white photographic negative via the direct photographic transfer of the negative onto lithographic printing plates.
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| The Eiffel Tower and the Trocadero, Paris |
Because no color information was preserved in the photographic process, the photographer would make detailed notes on the colors within the scene and use the notes to hand paint the negative before transferring the image through colored gels onto the printing plates.
The process was invented in the 1880s by Hans Jakob Schmid, an employee of the Swiss company Orell Gessner Füssli—a printing firm whose history began in the 16th century. From the mid-1890s the process was licensed by other companies, including the Detroit Photographic Company in the US and the Photochrom Company of London.
The photochrom process was most popular in the 1890s, when true color photography was first developed but was still commercially impractical. After World War I, which ended the craze for collecting photochrom postcards, the chief use of the process was for posters and art reproductions. The last photochrom printer operated up to 1970.
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| East coast at high tide, Mont St. Michel |
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| Rue de la Republic, Lyon |
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| Chateau de Duingt, Annecy |
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| The Pantheon and the Rue Soufflot, Paris |
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| Notre Dame de Bon Secours and Joan of Arc’s monument, Rouen |
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| Trouville beach |
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| A gallery in the Louvre, Paris |
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| The Latone Basin, Versailles |
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| Palace of the Grand Trianon, Versailles |
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| Chartres |
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| The Pavilions of the Nations, Exposition Universal, Paris |
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| Cable railway, Marseilles |
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| Arc de Triomphe, Paris |
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| Dinan |
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| Caen |
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| Tréport |
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| The valley of Chamonix from the Aiguille du Floria |
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| The Malavaux near Vichy |
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| Promenade and Grand Salon, Trouville |
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| La Grande Roue, Paris |
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| Thiers |
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| The Palace Lumineux, Exposition Universal, Paris |
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| Capitol Place, Toulouse |
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| The throne room, Fontainebleau Palace |
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| Dunkirk |
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| Trouville beach |
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| Entrance to harbor, St. Malo |
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| The Port Militaire and swing bridge, Brest |
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| Arena, Nîmes |
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| The Hôpital Spring, Vichy |
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| Gallery of Mirrors, Versailles |
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| Cauterets, Pyrenees |
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| Grand Street, St. Malo |
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| Notre Dame, Paris |
(via Library of Congress)
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