Scott Archer's views of Kenilworth Castle are among the earliest in the genre of photographs of ruined buildings so popular in the 1850's and 60's. They suggest several Pre-Raphaelite themes. Kenilworth was the setting of a novel by Walter Scott, whose mediaevalizing romances were read avidly by the young painters, especially D. G. Rossetti. The suggestive motif of ivy spreading across Grumbling brick appears frequently in Pre-Raphaelite work, beginning with Millais' 'The Huguenot' (1852). It allowed the painters to display fastidious handling, just as it showed up the merits of Scott Archer's invention. Millais and his followers used the motif as a background to prominent figures. Another painter associated with Pre-Raphaelitism, John Inchbold, concentrated on ruins and encroaching vegetation to the exclusion of the human element. Scott Archer's Kemlworth studies, with their shallow space, crumbling masonry and microscopic plant life, are especially close in feeling to Inchbold's 'The Chapel, Bolton' 1853 (Northampton Art Gallery) and 'At Bolton', 1855.