Elsie, 15, and Rose Hendon with Mary Toovey and Jean Rayner, 14, in front of the Seven Feathers Club in Edenham Street, North Kensington. Ken Russell In 1955, the fledgling photographer created a series called The Last of the Teddy Girls, which featured photographs taken against the war-torn backdrop of London’s East End. The images are one of the first reportage series to be made of British youth culture, presenting pictures of working class girls in Neo-Edwardian dress—a fascinating counterpoint to their drape-coated and drainpipe-wearing male counterparts the Teddy Boy. The Last of the Teddy Girls also provided a rare and unique glimpse of a little recognized and under-documented subculture of austere post war Britain.

Elsie, 15, and Rose Hendon with Mary Toovey and Jean Rayner, 14, in front of the Seven Feathers Club in Edenham Street, North Kensington. Ken Russell

In 1955, the fledgling photographer created a series called The Last of the Teddy Girls, which featured photographs taken against the war-torn backdrop of London’s East End. The images are one of the first reportage series to be made of British youth culture, presenting pictures of working class girls in Neo-Edwardian dress—a fascinating counterpoint to their drape-coated and drainpipe-wearing male counterparts the Teddy Boy. The Last of the Teddy Girls also provided a rare and unique glimpse of a little recognized and under-documented subculture of austere post war Britain.