Ackermann's Repository 1809 - 1828

Rudolf Ackermann was an interesting character, who was born in Germany in 1764. He started out in life as a carriage-maker, moving first to Paris and then London in the 1780s. By 1797 he was operating out of premises at 101, The Strand, London, and in 1798 began calling his establishment 'The Repository of Arts'. On the right is a view of the interior, an early plate from the Repository publication described below.

"The Repository of Arts, Literature, Commerce, Manufacture, Fashion & Science' was first published in January 1809, and continued through 240 monthly issues until 1828. Each issue contained many plates, including two of ladies' fashion, which many people consider to be the finest of the era. I include a fashion plate from the first edition on the left. I am lucky enough to have the complete set of volumes, although they are not matched.

A particular feature of the early plates were pretty young women engaged in their everyday pastimes (see right) and mothers with their children. I shall return to these in due course.

Early editions also featured Ackermann's other interests, including coach building, an example of which is given below.

By 1820 the publication was exclusively aimed at women and in 1829, was relaunched as 'Ackermann's Repository of Fashion'. Although I have quite a lot of plates from this volume, I have never actually seen a complete version.

Ackermann's merged soon afterwards with another publication of the time, 'La Belle Assemblee'. By this time Rudolf Ackermann was in poor health, having suffered a stroke in January 1830. He died in 1834 although the publishing house he founded continued to function right into the 20th Century.