shows photos of Japan between the 1860s and 1930s. In 1854, Japan opened its doors to the outside world for the first time in more than 200 years. It set in motion a truly astounding transformation. As fate would have it, photography had just been invented. As the old country vanished and a new one was born, daring photographers took photos. Discover what life was like with their rare and precious photographs of old Japan.

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Nobukuni Enami

Plain block letter style, with breathing room in the black space above and below the letters. Esaki and some others also use the plain block letter style, but the black surround is cut much closer to the letters than with Enami.

Kimbei Kusakabe

Kimbei is distinctive with his thinner block style, the number. (dot / period) and title. There is also a dot at the end.

Adolfo Farsari

Farsari is all Serif Letter+Numbers with Capital Serif letter titles.

Seibei Kajima

Kajima is Serif Numbers followed by Serif Upper and Lower Case Titles.

Kozaburo Tamamura

Although he didn’t do it for all photos, if you see a “No.” prefix, it’s a Tamamura print.

Many of these guys used each other’s images, so you might see the same photo here and there, but each with the distinctive titling of the several different photographers who “shared” the photos.

¹ Many thanks to Rob Oechsle for the background information.