Cambridge past and present

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Cambridge Then and Now

Vaughan Grills

Vaughan Grylls is a photographer, author and Cambridge enthusiast, as is evident in this charming book. While studying at the Slade School of Fine Art in the late 1960s Grylls gave guided tours of Cambridge to overseas visitors, so he knows the city inside out. After graduating from the Slade his first job was to teach sculpture at Homerton College Cambridge.

Grylls ‘uses photographs to show Cambridge as it was in the past and as it is today’. He does far more than that, however, showing how most of the changes have occurred where town meets gown. This originally happened 700 years ago when, into the market town of Cambridge, was inserted ‘cuckoo-like’ a university.

The historic images of Cambridge in black and white are paired with Grylls’ own striking colour photographs of today .The most celebrated views of Cambridge have remained virtually unchanged, perhaps less than any other city in England, but at the same time this city continues to embrace the latest developments. The wonderful view of King’s College Chapel from the Backs stands just two miles away from the high-tech business centre of Cambridge Science Park, or ‘Silicon Fen’ as it has come to be known.

This book includes photographs of all the architectural highlights of Cambridge, including the Bridge of Sighs, Trinity College Library, and King’s College Chapel, from where the first festival of Nine Lessons and Carols was broadcast in 1928; now a national tradition. It also shows other less obvious and less well-known buildings such as the Bull Hotel, King’s Parade. A black-and-white photograph dating from 1944 when it was a US military headquarters is paired with a modern colour one showing it now as part of St Catherine’s College.

One could go on about individual photographs, they are pretty spectacular but I urge you to take a look at this book for yourself. The scenes are wonderful, and at £12.99 this is very good value indeed. The only problem is that you have to wait until 25 July when it is published.

Cambridge Then and Now by Vaughan Grylls is published by Batsford. £12.99. ISBN 9781849940221

Phoebe Hunter, Art historian, London