Designing the packaging for “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”

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The “Sgt. Pepper” drumheads

In an interview with Album Cover Hall of Fame.com, Jann Haworth mentioned that she brought fairground painter Joe Ephgrave, who had previously painted wardrobes for both her and her mother, to paint the drumheads seen on the “Sgt. Pepper” cover.

Ephgrave painted two different versions of the drumhead and was paid £25 for his work. Both versions were attached to the bass drum to allow for easy changes during the photo shoot if necessary.

There were some speculations that Joe Ephgrave did not exist. It was rumored that his name “Ephgrave” was a shortened version of “Epitaph-grave” and was considered a “clue” for the “Paul Is Dead” rumor that spread in late 1969, despite Ephgrave being a real English surname.

The drum head was included in a 1994 auction at Sotheby’s where it sold for £52,100. In July 2008, it was sold again at Christie’s for £541,250 ($1.07 million).

During a more recent exchange of emails, Jann [Haworth] told me she had been searching for news of Joe Ephgrave, the artist who painted the Sgt. Pepper drum. He had been a friend of hers and Jann had one of his paintings, of a tiger, on her wall back in the sixties. I asked Jann if she had designed any other covers after the Sgt. Pepper cover. She had not done any covers for real records but in 2017 had taken Joe’s tiger design and produced a painting in the form of a record sleeve.

From recordart

The legendary hand-painted bass drumskin used on the front cover of the Beatles’ ground-breaking 1967 album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, the drumskin painted in gold, red, blue, green, pink and magenta and mounted on hardboard — 30.5in. (77.5cm.) diam, the skin mounted on a matched rope tension wooden bass drum painted in regulation military blue and red, with laminated hardwood shell with Boosey & Hawkes Ltd., 295 Regent Street, London. label [drum not original]; accompanied by a corresponding copy of the album; and a hand-written letter from Sir Peter Blake, signed, stating This is to confirm that…I have examined the painted drumskin that appears on the L.P. record ‘Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club’ by The Beatles, and that is the same drumskin, and is the genuine, original one painted by Joe Ephgrave…, […]

The vendor purchased this drum directly from Sotheby’s in 1994 and since that sale, the drumskin has undergone some restoration to the paintwork and has been attached to a military drum identical to that used in the original album photo shoot. Research at the Boosey & Hawkes Archives at the Horniman Museum, London has confirmed that the drum would likely date from the 1930s-1940s.

From The Beatles | Christie’s (christies.com), July 2008

For some time, Paul McCartney displayed the alternative version of the drum head in his Cavendish home in London.

The Beatles’ name spelt out in flowers

The arrangement of flowers spelling out “Beatles” in the foreground of the “Sgt. Pepper” cover, was Jann Haworth’s idea.

When we were designing the cover Paul came over to our house in Chiswick and I showed him a sketch of how we could spell out ‘Beatles’ in flowers, like they do with civic clocks. Paul liked the idea, and we planned to use colourful little flowers like cyclamen. But when the florist arrived, he brought horrible hyacinths which are tall and thin, and made it much harder to spell anything.

Jann Haworth – From Express.co.uk, May 13, 2017

The part that’s very much my own was that I always hated lettering on things. I loved the idea that lettering could be an integral part, and I was into fairground lettering at the time. So I thought it would be nice to have a real object with lettering on it, instead of lettering the cover. So I thought about the drum, then about the civic lettering that was around at that time. We pointed out to Paul the Hammersmith lettering: You could do it like that.

What I wanted was that very tight, little ice plants, a very tight floral near-tothe-ground thing. I discussed all this on the phone with the florists. Then they turned up with all these dumb plants — hyacinths. And then only a quarter of what we needed to cover the whole thing. After all these instructions. At least when they set it out you could read the word ‘Beatles’, but it was very much a failure in terms of the original concept.

Jann Haworth – From “Groovy Bob: The Life and Times of Robert Fraser” by Harriet Vyner, 1999

The Shirley Temple doll wearing a Rolling Stone striped shirt

Young actress Shirley Temple appeared three times on the “Sgt. Pepper” cover, with two photos and a cloth doll representing her, made by Jann Haworth and wearing a striped shirt that said “WMPS Good Guys Welcome the Rolling Stones.“

The Rolling Stones were friends of us all, and I think Robert thought that it would be a great harmonious gesture to actually acknowledge them on our record cover because everyone thought the Beatles and the Stones are always bitching at each other, so that would be far out. There were millions of ideas like that.

Paul McCartney – From “Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now” by Barry Miles, 1997

The little girl wearing the ‘Welcome The Rolling Stones, good guys’ sweatshirt, was a cloth figure of Shirley Temple. The shirt was coming from Michael Cooper’s young son, Adam.

Peter Blake – From “The Beatles: Off the Record” by Keith Badman, 2008

An ex-Vogue magazine photographer, [Michael Cooper] had established a friendship with The Rolling Stones. Consequently, his young son Adam had been given a sweatshirt saying “Good Guys Welcome The Rolling Stones”. In a magnanimous gesture, it was placed on a Shirley Temple cloth doll made by Jann Haworth.

From “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” boxset’s accompanying book, 2017

And there, in the far right corner, is a slouching Shirley Temple doll, wearing a striped shirt that says, “WMPS Good Guys Welcome the Rolling Stones.” The sweater was the creation of Mary Anne May, at the time a senior at Immaculate Conception High School. WMPS, a big AM-radio station in town, had a contest to win a chance to meet the Stones at their 1965 concert at the Coliseum. May, a big fan, was determined to win, so she “bought a kids striped shirt at the dollar store.” Mick Jagger was wearing striped shirts a lot onstage then, she pointed out. She stitched the letters on and hoped for the best. Her dream came true, and during intermission, she went backstage, holding her contest-winning creation. “Is this for me?” asked Jagger, taking the shirt. That’s the last she saw of it.

It eventually made its way to Peter Blake, the British Pop artist behind the Sgt. Pepper cover. May found out her shirt had made the big time when someone at WMPS spotted it on the album cover in the summer of 1967. “I rushed over to Pop Tunes to have a look,” she said, but she still had to save up her money to buy the album. (She no longer has her copy.)

Mary Anne May is now an elementary school art teacher who still lives in Memphis. Of her shirt’s brush with fame: “I have no idea where it is now. I’d love to have it back.”

From “‘Sgt. Pepper’ has Memphis connection” by Leanne Kleinmann – February 4, 2007 – From Meet the Beatles for Real: Stones and Sgt. Pepper

Selecting the famous people who would appear in the background

It was a group effort to decide which famous people should appear as life-sized cardboard cut-outs, with contributions from John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Robert Fraser, Peter Blake and Jann Haworth. According to Peter Blake, Ringo Starr didn’t suggest any name.

In the end, the cover collage includes 57 photographs and nine waxworks. It is not known for sure who chose who. However, John suggested Jesus and Adolf Hitler, but it was deemed safer not to include any of them. George suggested Mahatma Gandi and several Yogis. Gandi was however rejected by Sir Joseph Lockwood, the chairman of EMI, by fear of a negative impact on sales in India.

When Paul McCartney was asked why the Beatles did not include Elvis Presley among the musical artists, he replied: “Elvis was too important and too far above the rest even to mention.“

The other part of my concept was to get everyone in the group to mention their heroes. You’d have a portrait of someone and around him would be all the little portraits of Brando, James Dean, an Indian guru, whoever you were into. Or rather the alter ego’s heroes. There’d be H. G. Wells and Johnny Weissmuller, Issy Bonn and all those people, and Burroughs would have been a suggestion probably from Robert, and there were a few kind of LA guys that Robert had slipped in. He’d slip in people that we didn’t even know but we didn’t mind, it was the spirit of the thing. Those ideas developed and combined, so that instead of a mayoral presentation it became that famous cover.

Paul McCartney – From “Groovy Bob: The Life and Times of Robert Fraser” by Harriet Vyner, 1999

To help us get into the character of Sgt Pepper’s band, we started to think about who our heroes might be: Well, then, who would this band like on the cover? Who would my character admire?’ We wrote a list. They could be as diverse as we wanted,- Marlon Brando, James Dean, Albert Einstein – or whoever. So we started choosing… Dixie Dean (an old Everton football hero I’d heard my dad talk about, I didn’t really know him), Groucho Marx and so on. It got to be anyone we liked.

Paul McCartney – From “The Beatles Anthology” book, 2000

I remember being in the studio, and everybody was asking.- ‘Who do you want in the band?’ All these crazy suggestions were coming out. John was talking about Albert Stubbins – and nobody guite knew who he was. He was a Liverpool centre forward

Neil Aspinall – From “The Beatles Anthology” book, 2000

My father was an Oscar-winning production designer on films including Some Like It Hot, The Longest Day and Sayonara. I grew up on film sets and often saw my father craft scenes with two-dimensional cut-out figures in the background where they could look like a crowd. It was my idea that the front row be three-dimensional with The Beatles, behind them mannequins and full-size fabric dolls that I crafted, and behind those a two-dimensional flat frame filled with celebrity faces.

We wanted at least 70 figures and asked The Beatles to list their heroes. But McCartney and John Lennon combined barely suggested 20 names. George Harrison came up with a few Indian gurus that we included. Ringo claims that he came up with no one but I remember he selected the music-hall artist Issy Bonn, plus another celebrity who never made it on to the cover. John wanted Adolf Hitler, which I thought was a very ugly choice, beyond provocative. I have no idea what his thinking was. I think he has clay feet. We decided not to use Hitler. Aleister Crowley [a prominent satanist who had died in 1947] also made me uncomfortable. I don’t like the occult but he stayed in.

John also wanted Gandhi and Jesus on the cover, but using Jesus seemed sacrilegious, and The Beatles management decided not to use Gandhi because it might hurt sales in India, so both were dropped.

Looking back, I’m horrified that of 71 famous faces, the Beatles chose no women. Peter and I added only 12 women and three of those were Shirley Temple. The rest were pin-ups, mannequins or blondes such as Mae West and Diana Dors. If we made the cover today we would never have allowed such inequality. It’s partly my fault. I take responsibility. I should have known better.

Jann Haworth – From Express.co.uk, May 13, 2017

Jesus and Hitler were on John’s favourites list, but they had to be taken off. John was that kind of guy, but you couldn’t very well have Hitler and so he had to go. Gandhi also had to go, because the head of EMI, Sir Joseph Lockwood, said, ‘In India, they won’t allow the record to be printed.’ There were a few people who just went by the wayside.

Paul McCartney – From “The Beatles: Off the Record” by Keith Badman, 2008

They just wouldn’t let Gandhi be on the cover and Sir Joe Lockwood [EMI chairman] came round to my house to tell me this personally. He said it could be taken as an insult in India.

Paul McCartney – From “Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now” by Barry Miles, 1997

Why did you put all those people on the cover, like a school photograph gone wrong?

These were all just cult heroes. George chose a few of his schoolmates he liked; and the rest of us said names we liked the sound of: like Aldous Huxley, H. G. Wells, Johnny Weissmuller.

Those Indian people have amazing stories. There’s one called Yogananda Para Manza, who died in 1953 and left his body in an incredibly perfect state. Medical reports in Los Angeles three or four months after he died were saying this is incredible; this man hasn’t decomposed yet. He was sitting there glowing because he did this sort of transcendental bit, transcended his body by planes of consciousness. He was taught by another person on the cover and he was taught by another, and it all goes back to the one called Babujee who’s just a little drawing looking upwards.

You can’t photograph him – he’s an agent. He puts a curse on the film. He’s the all-time governor, he’s been at it a long time and he’s still around doing the transcending bit.

These are all George’s heroes?

Yes. George says the great thing about people like Babujee and Christ and all the governors who have transcended is that they’ve got out of the reincarnation cycle: they’ve reached the bit where they are just there; they don’t have to zoom back.

So they’re there planning the spiritual thing for us. So, if they are planning it, what a groove that he’s got himself on our cover, night in the middle of the Beatles’ LP cover! Normal ideas of God wouldn’t have him interested in Beatles music or any pop – it’s a bit infra dig – but obviously, if we’re all here doing it, and someone’s interested in us, then it’s all to do with it. There’s not one bit worse than another bit. So that’s great, that’s beautiful that he’s right on the cover with all his mates.

Paul McCartney – Interview with The Observer, November 1967

There’s one or two on there that a lot of people would not even know. There’s the obvious ones, like Marilyn Monroe, and there’s an old singer on there called Izzy Bon …

Alistair Taylor – From “The Beatles: Off the Record” by Keith Badman, 2008

Sourcing photos and preparing the cardboard cut-outs

Once the list of names was compiled, appropriate photographs of the people had to be located. Specialized photo libraries were used, as well as assistance from the Indica Book Store, managed by Paul McCartney’s friends Barry Miles and John Dunbar, and friends or family for some individuals. The photos were then enlarged, colorized, and mounted on cardboard cut-outs.

In 2017, Chris Shaw attempted to identify all the original photos used for the “Sgt. Pepper” cover. During this process, he was contacted by Nigel Hartnup, assistant to photographer Michael Cooper, who provided many details about the sourcing and preparation of the cardboard cut-outs:

When Michael Cooper flew to New York to research the Rolling Stones 3D cover for ‘Their Satanic Majesties Request’, the list of names for the crowd appeared and suitable photographs of the people had to be found. This wasn’t easy. Jann Haworth and Peter Blake did the majority and mostly used specialised photo libraries such as the BBC Radio Times Hulton Picture Library, but sometimes we had to source directly from friends or family. John arranged for former Beatle, Stuart Sutcliffe’s photo to come by special delivery from his parents. The Liverpool football player, Albert Stubbins came by post from LFC.

As they arrived, we photographed the head shots and enlarged them to life size on 20 x 16 paper and sent them off to be professionally mounted on hardboard. Some of the characters were very beautiful full-length figures, such as Marlene Dietrich and Tom Mix, so we decided to get a photo lab to print and mount them full size, as we didn’t have such equipment in Chelsea Manor Studios. We then hired a carpenter to come with his jigsaw and carefully cut them out. My biggest contribution came next.

My dad had always loved photography and when he was a young man, he coloured many of his favourite hand printed b/w photographs with photographic dyes and he taught me how to tint photos this way. It’s not easy. You have to be patient, yet fast, and put on a layer of diluted dye, then wipe it off, then another, wipe it off, then another, until you get the subtle result required. It’s tedious work that needs patience and care. I tried to teach the others how to do it, but one person, (who shall be nameless!) was a disaster, and wasn’t allowed to do a second one. Just look at Aldous Huxley!

I was most proud of Marlene Dietrich, H.G.Wells, W.C.Fields, Max Miller and Carl Jung. I did lots of others too, and I can proudly boast that the best ones were mine, except for Tom Mix, which Trevor did. Peter Blake’s wife, Jann Haworth did Tyrone Power and Oliver Hardy; perhaps a couple more.

Nigel Hartnup – Assistant to photographer Michael Cooper – From The man who *really* took the photo – Sgt Pepper Photos (wordpress.com), July 12, 2017

We spent almost two weeks constructing the set at the studio of photographer Michael Cooper, who shot the final image. We were printing black and white images of the celebrity faces, gluing them to hardboard, cutting them out with a jig-saw, and fixing them to the backdrop. I hand-coloured most myself. I started with Tyrone Power, which is why he looks as orange as Donald Trump. I went lighter with the colour after that.

Jann Haworth – From Express.co.uk, May 13, 2017

Constructing the set

Creating the cardboard cutouts was only part of the process. It took almost two weeks to create the set at photographer Michael Cooper’s studio, leading to the photo shoot on March 30, 1967.

We spent almost two weeks constructing the set at the studio of photographer Michael Cooper, who shot the final image. We were printing black and white images of the celebrity faces, gluing them to hardboard, cutting them out with a jig-saw, and fixing them to the backdrop. I hand-coloured most myself. I started with Tyrone Power, which is why he looks as orange as Donald Trump. I went lighter with the colour after that.

At the last minute Madame Tussauds agreed to lend us their four Beatles waxwork figures, plus Diana Dors, HG Wells, Lawrence of Arabia and Sonny Liston. Paul invited us to his home, driving through a crowd of screaming, crying fans, to play us a few tracks from the album. I wish I’d heard Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds, because I would have painted the sky black instead of blue.

Jann Haworth – From Express.co.uk, May 13, 2017

I wanted to have the waxworks of The Beatles because I thought that they might be looking at Sgt Pepper’s band too. The boy who delivered the floral display asked if he could contribute by making a guitar out of hyacinths, and the little girl wearing the ‘Welcome The Rolling Stones, good guys’ sweatshirt, was a cloth figure of Shirley Temple. The shirt was coming from Michael Cooper’s young son, Adam. The Beatles arrived during the evening of 30 March. We had a drink, they got dressed and we did the session.

Peter Blake – From “The Beatles: Off the Record” by Keith Badman, 2008

What I wanted was that very tight, little ice plants, a very tight floral near-tothe-ground thing. I discussed all this on the phone with the florists. Then they turned up with all these dumb plants — hyacinths. And then only a quarter of what we needed to cover the whole thing. After all these instructions. At least when they set it out you could read the word ‘Beatles’, but it was very much a failure in terms of the original concept.

The other part I felt very strongly about was that when you went from the front, you wanted to have that connecting point of 3-D things that bled into the 2-D things, as we were not doing it as artwork. This bothered Peter a lot later, because it was so retouched, so messed about, the photograph, it ended up looking like artwork, a collage done on paper, rather than a set that was built. Madame Tussaud’s were very generous, lending us some figures, and then the Beatles were going to be in front of the crowd, and I put some of my figures in, and that blended the 3-D world into the 2-D world.

Jann Haworth – From “Groovy Bob: The Life and Times of Robert Fraser” by Harriet Vyner, 1999

Robert Fraser was a business partner of Michael Cooper, an excellent photographer, so he was commissioned to do the shoot. I worked in his studio for a fortnight, constructing the collage, fixing the top row to the back wall and putting the next about six inches in front and so on, so that we got the tiered effect. Then, we put in the palm tree and the other little objects.

Peter Blake – From “The Beatles: Off the Record” by Keith Badman, 2008

Michael [Cooper] had nothing to do with [creating the cardboard cut-outs], but before he left for New York, he arranged for a carpenter to build a wooden flower-bed with nails sticking through the bottom, spelling out the name ‘Beatles’. This was to be filled with a layer of earth so that gardeners could come with a van full of potted hyacinths, and the flower heads chopped off and stuck on the nails. It would then be surrounded by soil and fake grass laid out to make a public park appearance.

We kept in close touch with Peter Blake, as the overall design was his and he did much of the general organisation, like communicating with Madame Tussaud’s, so we could borrow waxworks of Sonny Liston, Diana Dors and, of course, the Beatles themselves. Peter was, and is, a very nice man, kind, gentle and considerate of others. It was a real pleasure to work with him.

Trevor and I discussed the lighting and we agreed that we would construct a false white ceiling and bounce the flash off that. Used on its own, the ‘fish fry’ wouldn’t cover all the set. A ‘fish fry’ was a large rectangular box with a powerful flash unit inside and a diffusing white plastic sheet, which softened the harsh electronic flash lighting. It was the latest thing in those days for fashion photography. Used in conjunction with a couple of strip lights for the background it was Michael’s favourite tool.

We proceeded to get the set prepared. Peter came to the studio and expressed his ideas for the way it should all be laid out and we set to work. Heads had to be tacked to the wall in a particular order and he took control of that. A shelf was constructed to hold the waxwork heads and the others that he had brought and everything began to take on an urgency that was typical of the photography business in the sixties. Michael then returned from New York and took control of how the set was put together.

The problems started when the frame arrived for the garden. Trevor and I were horrified to see its size, as we knew immediately that it was far too big for the studio. The idea had been for the flower bed to be surrounded by grass, then a gap for the Beatles to stand in, and behind that would be the crowd. Some depth was essential to give a more realistic feel to the shot. Now, with such a large garden, that was not possible, as it had to be farther away from the camera and the final effect would be flat. Sadly, that was how it turned out, as Michael had given the carpenter the wrong measurements!

We suggested to Michael our plan to reflect light from a false ceiling, but he said that he wanted to use his signature lighting of ‘fish fry’ and strip lights, and wouldn’t listen to our technical advice that it wouldn’t cover such a large set. So we put the set together, the gardeners cut the heads off the hyacinths and constructed the garden and only then did Michael realise that the lighting he’d suggested wouldn’t work. So, with a studio full of people and the set almost complete, he announced that we had to construct a false ceiling and bounce the light off that. We couldn’t believe it! This would have been much easier to do when we suggested it in the first place and now we had to pretend it was his idea and go through the difficult process of building it all, with the flower garden underneath. I was furious, but just had to quietly get on with it.

Nigel Hartnup – Assistant to photographer Michael Cooper – From The man who *really* took the photo – Sgt Pepper Photos (wordpress.com), July 12, 2017

The photo shoot

On March 30, 1967, after some weeks of preparation to have all the setup ready, The Beatles visited Michael Cooper’s Photographic Studio in Chelsea, for the shooting.

It took about three hours in all, including the shots for the centrefold and the back cover.

Peter Blake – From “The Beatles: Off the Record” by Keith Badman, 2008

[…] Then we had to put the camera as far away and as high as possible, which meant putting the tripod on a table and extend it to full stretch, which meant that I had to be the one who managed the camera, as I’m 6’ 2” tall. So my head was squashed into the corner between wall and ceiling as I tried to yell instructions to Trevor and Andy where and how things in the set should be arranged. A particular problem was the reflections from the photographs of the heads. “Tilt Bob Dylan forward a bit. Yes. Now push Mae West’s right shoulder back – not that much – Yes. Now, Shift Karl Marx to the left a bit!” I suddenly realised what I’d said and had to laugh, but nobody else spotted it and wondered why I was amused. It was bizarre.

Soul music was throbbing constantly in the studio, headed by Otis Reading, Wilson Pickett, Booker T and the MGs and many albums that were unavailable in England. Few people stood still. Everybody was moving some part of their body with the beat. The joint was jumping, as they say.

It was not just the photographic crew and the Beatles who were there. There were two people from Madame Tussauds who had arrived earlier in the day with all the waxworks. I was particularly amused by Sonny Liston, who arrived without his head, which came in separately, in a box, with lots of padding. It was very realistic and sinister and I remember taking a photograph of this bizarre boxed head.

When he was assembled, I was delighted to discover that he was smaller than me, and I had Trevor take a photo to prove it.

There was also Diana Dors and the heads of T E Lawrence and George Bernard Shaw. Also there were the waxworks of The Beatles. The idea was that Sgt Pepper and his Lonely Hearts Club Band should be in the foreground and The Beatles were to be in the audience watching them. However, this never really worked, as the set was too squashed and flat. This was a great pity. We were very grateful for the waxworks, but had to be very careful with them, as they are very valuable. We weren’t allowed to handle them.

It was a strange time. With so many full size figures around, I would find myself dodging dummies as if they were real people and then bumping into someone because I thought they were a cut-out and was surprised when they moved.

Obviously, Peter and Jan were there that night and also Robert Fraser, with his driver, Mohammed, and the Beatles ‘minder’, Mal Evans, but there were other folk that I didn’t know. Earlier in the evening, Michael’s four year old son, Adam, was there, so presumably, Michael’s ex-wife, Rosie, was too, but I don’t remember. The place was packed!

Another problem arose at this time. Communication between me, on the camera, and Trevor and Andy on the set was crucial, but there were so many people in the studio that I could not be heard. Also, so many people were smoking that the atmosphere was thickening and threatening the air quality. I have to say that it was not just tobacco, but lots of weed was being passed around. The three of us didn’t partake until it was all finished, as we had serious work to do. Eventually, I just had to throw everybody out while we put the finishing touches to the set. When they were allowed to return, they were not permitted to smoke, at least not in the studio!

Apart from the tinting, there were two personal contributions I made. When I was at Vogue, I worked for James Mortimer, who was a very sympathetic person and a very competent photographer. He did fashion work, but mostly he did room sets and I built these for him in the studio. His hobby was car racing and he drove a Marcos, which was a car with a wooden chassis. This made it safer, because if there was a crash, it just snapped apart and the driver was thrown away ‘safely’. The car could then be glued back together again. I thought this was a fascinating idea and my girl friend had given me a Dinky toy Marcos, which I put in the hand of the figure made by Peter Blake’s wife, Jann Haworth. It’s small, but clearly visible.

My other contribution involved a gnome. Obviously, a garden had to have gnomes, and they are known to be naughty, so I photographed the back view of one and planned to put it at the front, as if he was peeing on the garden. However, it just didn’t look right; the idea didn’t work, so I removed it. A pity, as I still think it was a fun idea. After the shoot was over, I had the back view signed by the Beatles, which I sold a few years ago. Interestingly, it resold in 2015 for £29,000. I also had Marlene Dietrich signed, which I was very proud of. She became a prominent figure on the set.

When the time arrived to take the photos, Michael still couldn’t get up to the camera, so he stood in front and directed the Beatles and told me when to press the trigger. So it was actually me who took the photographs. It was normal at the time for the assistant to be on the camera when dealing with large format, technical cameras and it certainly doesn’t mean I claim them as mine. I just pressed the shutter. Michael used his 35mm Nikon for the seated photos that were used on the inside. […]

Nigel Hartnup – Assistant to photographer Michael Cooper – From The man who *really* took the photo – Sgt Pepper Photos (wordpress.com), July 12, 2017

When the shoot was over, much of the set was simply thrown away. We had no idea it would be part of rock ’n’ roll history. Someone grabbed the drum skins reading ‘Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’, which we’d paid £25 to have made. They later sold for $1 million.

Jann Haworth – From Express.co.uk, May 13, 2017

In addition to the front cover shot, The Beatles also posed for the images used on the back cover and the gatefold sleeve.

One of the things we were very much into in those days was eye messages. I had seen a thing on TV about eye contact in apes, and I’d become fascinated by this whole idea that you don’t look at each other. So with Michael Cooper’s inside photo, we all said, “Now, look into the camera and really say ‘I love you!'” If you look at it, you’ll see the big effort in the eyes.

Paul McCartney – From “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” boxset’s accompanying book, 2017

After the photo shoot, The Beatles went to EMI Studios, Abbey Road, to continue the recording of the album.

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