The Parish Church Photographic Survey

The photographic coverage will eventually include nearly every rural Church of England parish church in the country, effectively forming a national photographic archive of parish churches. Each church is being photographed in detail and coverage includes all monuments to 1900, all pre-1800 glass, all pre-1800 brasses, most fonts, all hatchments, all royal arms, all wall paintings (both pre and post Reformation), all pre-1800 pulpits and seating, all west galleries, 19th century stained glass noted in the Buildings of England, etc.

 

This is the most comprehensive photographic documentation of parish churches ever undertaken in the UK, and now forms the largest image archive of English church art and architecture in Europe, and quite possibly the world.[1]

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The photographic archive will eventually contain over 600,000 pictures. Information on the current status of the project can be found in the Annual Reports on this site.

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[1] Photographic archives, such as the National Monuments Record, contain more photographs, but they have numerous repeats of the same subjects due to the fact that they have been built up from donated photographic collections.