Bombay - Smoking Room, The Taj Mahal Hotel
The Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in Bombay, which opened in 1903, was very popular with visitors and on postcards.
1900-1909
A Persian Gypsy Woman and Her Children
[Original caption] A Persian Gypsy Woman and Children. These itinerant vendors of small articles travel far and wide through India, often pretending also to occult knowledge.
Punjab Rose
An impressive studio shot that lays bare the artifice used to make these images work: the painted backdrop with visible border, the matching design shoes and carpet, the desk or piano the woman's arm is resting on, surrounded by an oval frame common
Singhalese ayah (Nurse Maid)
Plate & Co. in Colombo dominated the postcard trade on the island of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), and sold half a million postcards in 1907 alone, an enormous sum for a single publisher.
The Huzuri Bagh, Lahore
A beautiful example by one of the premiere Lahore coloured postcard publishers, Peshawar-based D.C. Mehra and Sons.
An Indian Actress
A startling image of an Indian actress, carrying a bow in one hand, perhaps from the play she is acting in. But is it a she?
Lucknow Modjibaman
This view of the Aasafi Mosque in Lucknow was published by J. Serravallo in Trieste, Italy, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Gwalior Fortress. Colossal Figure 62 Ft. High.
[Original caption] Gwalior Fortress-Colossal Figures. Gwalior Fortress stands stern and strong 300 feet above the town.
Coolie with his Basket
A postcard by the great Indian painter M.V. Dhurandhar illustrating an Englishwoman looking over a coolie offering his services with an empty basket. Note the cleverly positioned Indian woman with a basket on her head in the background.
The message
A Cobbler
An early postcard that blends photography, the collotype printing process and colorization to produce what the Germans called a "Lichtdruck" or "light print" that resembles a painting.
