Late 19th Century Wages & Living (Artist, Journalist)

[bremoisaho]

Writing a story that is set in London in 1891. One of my MC's is an artist who has recently graduated from The Royal Academy of Art and after a bump from The Times, is showing at the recent viewing.

What kind of wages would he be making?
How much would a painting typically cost?

MC2 has just made Principle Journalist at The Times, and is also living

Comments

[bopeepsheep]

his father who is a wealthy Marquee
Is he intense? (Sorry.) You probably mean Marquess. I hope.

[chickenfeet2003]

He had good in-tent-ions

[bopeepsheep]

A wicked young man from Tashkent
On causing a scandal was bent.
He went for a spree
Inside a marquee -
'Twas done with Mal Ishers in tent.

[chickenfeet2003]

I'm now wondering what the courtesy title for a younger son/daughter of a Marquee might be... Bivisac perhaps?

[alextiefling]

"Regency and Victorian" is much too early for 1the 1890s. This is the world of Sherlock Holmes and Jonathan Harker, rather than Mr Darcy or Mr Pickwick.

[jayb111]

A single young man probably wouldn't live in a flat, unless he could afford, and wanted the bother of, a manservant to look after it and him. He'd be more likely to rent a room or rooms in a house and have his meals prepared by his landlady, as in Sherlock Holmes. In fact, the Sherlock Holmes stories are a very good guide to life in London for single men in the 1880s and 1890s.

Chelsea was an area popular with artists.

A painting could sell for whatever you wanted, depending on how successful you wanted him to be. There was quite a lot of work available for commercial artists at the time, too - book and magazine illustrations, advertising - if he couldn't earn enough from original work.

Don't take anything about the Regency/Jane Austen's era as in any way a guide to the late Victorian period. Even 'the Victorian period' is too general. Things changed hugely between the 1830s and the 1890s.

[bremoisaho]

A single young man probably wouldn't live in a flat, unless he could afford, and wanted the bother of, a manservant to look after it and him. He'd be more likely to rent a room or rooms in a house and have his meals prepared by his landlady, as in Sherlock Holmes. In fact, the Sherlock Holmes stories are a very good guide to life in London for single men in the 1880s and 1890s.

I had originally planned MC1's flat to be similar to Sherlocks (rented, and all that jazz). I had considered the possibility for MC2 but I thought maybe he would have been too wealthy to want to rent, but you have a good point about having to take care of it. He will most likely be renting now!

[alextiefling]

Even the wealthy rent flats; freehold or long-term ownership of central London flats is too much hassle for non-specialists. I expect that even Lord Peter Wimsey doesn't own the flat on Piccadilly outright, although it may form part of a portfolio owned by his family.

[nineveh_uk]

Indeed Peter Wimsey doesn't own the Piccadilly flat. It says specifically somewhere that it's a service flat in a new block (and it isn't family, because Bunter finds it).

Even when he gets married the London house is leasehold or rented.

/has far to good a memory of Wimsey trivia!

[bremoisaho]

checking out both of those sources, thank you!
Edit: Do you know what novels would have talked about artists? There are just a bunch of Project Gutenberg and I'd like to narrow it down.

[drachenmina]

Not directly related to any of your queries, but you may find this invaluable for peripheral detail & concrete data on prices of various items: Henry Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor.

[jayb111]

Mayhew is excellent, but much too early for the OP's purposes.