Photography and the seaside holiday developed together. From the middle of Queen Victoria's reign until the outbreak of the First World War, as holidays became increasingly popular, the number of photographs offered for sale as mementos of a magical week by the coast grew enormously. When ingenious methods of coloring photographs became available in the 1890s, the coloured holiday photographic print, and later the picture postcard, defined the seaside memory. Through a wonderful collection of coloured photographs covering many of England's coastal resorts, linked to a selected written commentaries from Charles Dickens and others, this unique book celebrates the heyday of the seaside holiday.