Yana Skakun
City of London · The Square Mile
Professional Headshots
City of London
Corporate portraits, LinkedIn headshots, and team photography in the Square Mile. Legal, finance, insurance, and professional services professionals — naturally photographed in their own professional world.
Book Your SessionBank · Leadenhall · St Paul's · Moorgate
Headshot Photography in the Square Mile
The City of London — the historic Square Mile — is home to the world's highest concentration of legal, financial, and professional services institutions per unit area. Barristers' chambers in Temple and Gray's Inn Road, solicitors at Freshfields and Linklaters, bankers at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, insurers at Lloyd's and Hiscox, accountants at PwC and Deloitte: the City's professional geography is immensely dense, and the architecture that has accumulated around two thousand years of commercial activity is one of the most varied and historically resonant outdoor portrait settings in Europe.
My work in the City of London centres on this context. Where a studio headshot is deliberately context-free, a headshot taken on location in the City uses the architecture — the Royal Exchange's Greek Revival portico, the ornate ironwork of Leadenhall Market, the neoclassical Bank of England facade, the garden churchyards of Wren's surviving City churches — to communicate professional identity through setting. The result is a portrait that places you in your professional world, rather than isolating you from it.
Sessions can be based on location, at your office, in your chambers, or any combination. The City's public spaces are among London's most accessible for portrait photography — many of the most architecturally significant settings (Bank Junction, Leadenhall Market, the Guildhall Yard, the Churchyard gardens) are publicly accessible throughout the working week. I work efficiently in the City environment, usually shooting 45-minute sessions during the working day and adapting to business schedules.
Who I Photograph
City of London Professionals
Legal — Solicitors & BarristersInvestment Banking & Corporate FinanceInsurance & Lloyd's MarketAccounting & Audit (Big 4)Asset Management & WealthCompliance & Risk ManagementCorporate Real EstateProfessional Services & Advisory
Session Locations
Where I Photograph in the City
Bank Junction & Royal Exchange
The intersection of Threadneedle Street, Cornhill, and King William Street — with the Royal Exchange's classical portico, the Bank of England's windowless Portland stone fortress, and the Lord Mayor's Mansion House fronting the junction — is one of the most architecturally dense and historically weighty corners of any European city. Headshots taken here require no caption: the context is immediate and globally recognised.
Leadenhall Market & Lime Street
Horace Jones's 1881 Victorian market — ornate cast iron, cobalt blue and burgundy ironwork, the soaring glazed roof — is the most visually spectacular interior in the City of London. The arcade's combination of Victorian grandeur and immediate City finance context (Lloyd's of London next door, Willis Towers Watson, Hiscox) makes it the premier headshot location for insurance and legal professionals based in EC3.
St Paul's Churchyard & Ludgate Hill
The public space surrounding Wren's Cathedral — the steps, the churchyard with its views north along Ludgate Hill, the gardens behind the Cathedral giving a gentler natural setting within the City — gives an outdoor portrait location of immense gravitas and historical depth. The morning light on the Cathedral's south face is particularly beautiful from 8–10am.
Guildhall Yard & Gresham Street
The Guildhall Yard's medieval and Victorian architecture — the Great Hall's Gothic windows, the Roman amphitheatre outline set into the courtyard paving, the Art Gallery's postmodern frontage — gives the City's most historically layered outdoor portrait setting. Gresham Street and the surrounding Cheapside area offer quieter Georgian and Victorian street settings for less formal portrait work.
Your City Office (EC1–EC4)
I come to your office across the Square Mile. The upper floors of City tower offices typically have excellent north or east-facing window light, and the framing of the City roofscape or the Thames through floor-to-ceiling glazing provides an immediately professional context. I carry portable reflectors and a small light panel for conference rooms or internal spaces with lower light levels.
Barbican & Moorgate
The Barbican's Brutalist residential and arts complex — the lake, the highwalk system, the distinctive concrete geometry — offers a completely different aesthetic from the financial City, useful for professionals in media, arts management, or technology based in the EC area who want a headshot that reads 'City of London' without the explicit banking-district connotations of the Bank or Lloyd's areas.
Packages & Pricing
City of London Headshot Packages
Solo Headshot
£195
- 45-minute session
- 3 fully retouched images
- 1–2 outfit changes
- City of London location or your office
- Private online gallery
- 5-day delivery
Popular
Full Session
£350
- 90-minute session
- 20+ edited selects
- 5 fully retouched hero images
- Multiple City locations
- 4–6 outfit changes
- Private online gallery
Team Photography
From £650
- Half-day at your City office
- Up to 8 team members
- Consistent brand-ready style
- Individual galleries per person
- LinkedIn + website ready files
- 2-day turnaround available
Travel to City of London included. All prices include VAT.
City of London Headshots FAQs
What makes the City of London different from Canary Wharf for headshots?+
The City is the original Square Mile — 2,000 years of continuous financial and commercial activity concentrated in one kilometre of London. Where Canary Wharf is glass tower modernism (1980s–2020s), the City is layered: Wren churches, Georgian counting houses, Victorian insurance palaces, Modernist towers and Renzo Piano curves all within 400 metres of each other. For legal, insurance, and traditional banking professionals, the City's architecture carries more historical and institutional weight. For Fintech or asset management, the City's east end (around Liverpool Street and Bishopsgate) gives a more contemporary character. The variety within the City boundary means that your headshot background can be chosen to match your specific professional positioning.
Can you photograph inside City offices and chambers?+
Yes — I regularly photograph in City offices, chambers, and professional premises. Barristers' chambers typically have excellent library or corridor settings; law firm offices often have good window light from upper floors with City views. For chambers and regulated premises, you'll need to arrange visitor access in advance. I work efficiently and carry minimal equipment so as not to disrupt a working environment.
Is Leadenhall Market accessible for photography?+
Leadenhall Market is a public thoroughfare — there are no photography restrictions for personal or editorial photography within the arcades. For commercial photography shoots (team photography, advertising), you'd need a filming permit from the City of London Corporation, which I can advise on. For individual and small-group headshot sessions (up to 3–4 people), the market is freely usable and I have extensive experience shooting there efficiently without occupying the space for other users.
Do you offer same-day or next-day delivery for City headshots?+
Rush delivery (24–48 hours from session to gallery delivery) is available for an additional fee. This is regularly used by clients needing headshots for immediate press releases, conference speaker bios, or urgent website updates. Standard delivery is 5 business days. For urgent requests, please mention the deadline when you get in touch so I can schedule accordingly.
How do your City headshots compare with major studio headshot providers?+
Large headshot studios in the City (typically operating from fixed studio premises near Liverpool Street or Farringdon) provide standardised sessions: a defined backdrop, defined lighting setup, fixed duration, and a set number of output images. My approach is different — I work on location and in available light, the background is chosen to match your specific professional identity and sector, and the pace and direction of the session adapts to each individual. The result is a headshot that looks like a specific professional in a specific professional environment, rather than one of a hundred identical portraits produced on the same day in the same setup.
Do you travel to the City of London from Cambridge?+
Yes — I travel to the City of London (Cambridge to Liverpool Street is 50 minutes by train; the City is a 5–10 minute walk from Liverpool Street or one Tube stop). Travel costs for City of London sessions are included in the quoted prices. I work across central London regularly and schedule City sessions efficiently to travel from Cambridge or combine with other London bookings on the same day.
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Get in Touch
Book City of London Headshots
Tell me your preferred date, location, and professional context — I reply within 24 hours.