Lauren Lavelle was a popular model in the late 1940s into the 1950s. Her real name was Lauren Duncan and she also modeled under the name of Lauren Hastings. I have parts of two separate strip set photos from the 1950s that I am posting here. These are all 4×5 inch prints.

These photos were taken in the 1950s by the a bondage/kink photographer whose photos often show the shadow of a well wheel in the background. I have photos from what must have been a large number of sets, usually only one or a couple of photos belonging to a set. The exception is the group that follows. These are all 4×5 inch prints. The originals were not numbered, though I have numbered reprints made not long after the originals were shot.

The last photo shows more of the studio setting and has the well wheel hanging from a post on the upper right of the image. Part of the studio lighting and stand can be seen to the left.

I am posting a group of photographs that appear to be 1950s reprints of earlier photographs. These have a number for the set and I have a scattering of other photographs that are reprints with the same apparent vintage and numbering style. I think these were reprinted and sold by Gargoyle, a Leonard Burtman offshoot that operated in the late 1950s. There is nothing behind the belief other than these are reprints and there was a company called Gargoyle and they might have created and sold the reprints.

When these photographs were created they weren’t copyrighted. Charles Guyette photos weren’t copyrighted and reprints were sold by Irving Klaw (whose early photographs weren’t copyrighted either) and originals were used as illustrations in Burtman’s magazines such as Exotique. John Willie’s photographs were not copyrighted either.

Anyway, here are the photographs. The prints are on 4×5 inch paper but the images are narrower and originally were on a different size paper. There are three groups: bound dress model, bound swimsuit model, and single photo from a different shoot.

When I first began buying John Willie LA bondage photographs the key for me was the backgrounds. A certain background would let me know that was a John Willie photo. After a while I became familiar with the models and Willie’s bondage style and key indicators for a Willie photo expanded. There was a distinctive background for strip set photographs that caught my attention. At first I’d find a photo here or there and purchase it if I could. At a certain point I found a complete strip set group of 12 4×5 inch photos. I believe these photographs were shot in a burlesque theater around 1950.

Erotic photographs were shot in a variety of locations in the 1920s, 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. The most common settings for 1950s stripset nudes were a hotel or motel room, outdoors, and a studio. The studio in 1950s photographs doesn’t call attention to itself. There are not typical studio props or backgrounds which are found in earlier studio photographs. Studio props include columns, corrugated backgrounds, drapery, and so forth which are most common in earlier studio photographs and are used to enhance lighting effects.

I always associate studio nudes like this with those taken in the 1930s and 1940s but I think this model’s photos were taken in the 1950s. What caught my eye when these photos became available was the model’s relaxed poses and the lighting.