Most of the old homes in Charleston don’t have much land. Like modern cities the house took up most of the space, a small garden was all there was room for.

This home, the Aiken-Rhett house, has land, and several large back building to explore. There were stables, servant / slave quarters, kitchens, laundry, even work shops.

Unless it’s obvious I don’t know details on the various rooms. My attention is on what and how to photograph these places.

When this house was built having land, buildings, servants of this size meant enormous wealth. Just as amazing is the fact it survived the Civil War. It was looted at least once, but there is still much of the original buildings intact.

The insides of the structures have the original plaster, handmade bricks, and woodwork.

I always view this type of building from a black and white perspective. While some images are published in color for me this is old school work.

Each photograph here was ultimately finished using methods to emulate specific 35 mm photograph film. Most are Ilford film since that’s what I am most familiar with. Adobe Lightroom, Faststone, and DxO Silver Efex are the image software used.