The Polaroid Corporation was launched in 1937 becoming a touchstone for American innovation and engineering prowess. It was the brainchild of scientist and inventor Edwin Land and his Harvard tutor George Wheelwright and at first made the plastic for polarizing sunglasses with the same effect the new and best golf sunglasses. In time, it was to create and popularize instant photography, launching a seriesof pioneering cameras and film formats. These inspired generations of artists, including Andy Warhol, Helmut Newton, Robert Mapplethorpe, Maripol, Keith Haring and Guy Bourdin. They helped to raise Polaroid to the status of cultural icon.

This month, Polaroid Originals, launched the OneStep+ instant analogue camera which brings analogue instant photography up to date, as it can be connected to a smartphone app, enabling a range of effects. In 1943, Land’s three-year-old daughter asked her father why she couldn’t immediately see the photograph he had just taken of her. His first instant camera went on sale for $89.95 in 1948, and became the the template for Polaroid cameras for the next 15 years.

Throughout the 50s, the Polaroid empire grew, with products distributed to more than 45 countries. The Polaroid SX-70 camera – the first camera to produce self-developing, colour instant photos – was launched in 1972. Edwin Land also appeared on the cover of Life magazine with his “magic camera”. But, with the swift rise of digital technology eclipsing instant photography by the 2000s, in 2008 Polaroid announced that it was stopping making instant film.