Herbert C. White (1896–1962) was an American Adventist missionary, photographer and art director who published Peking the Beautiful in 1927. This book is a collection of seventy often hand-coloured photographs capturing Beijing's monuments, temples, and city walls before many of these historic landmarks were destroyed in the 1920s.

The book includes a notable introduction by Chinese scholar and professor Hu Shih. White was assisted by his twin brother J. Henry White who was an American pictorialist photographer who focused on artistic, atmospheric views, often using a Graflex camera to manage difficult lighting conditions on architectural subjects.

Published in Shanghai, the book is famous for its luxurious embroidered silk binding and its dedication to preserving the disappearing artistic heritage of China's capital.  The seventy pictures were selected from a massive collection of over 3,000 photos of Peking and its vicinity taken by the White brothers between 1922 and the mid-1920s.

The book often sold in a pictorial wooden box or slipcase, bound in padded embroidered blue silk. The White brothers also published a similar work, Romantic China, in 1930.

Click here for an online version of the book - over several sets

        Set One    Set Two    Set Three

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