In Pictures: Sand and sprockets as steampunk fans descend on Whitby

Swimsuits, caps and sunglasses made way for satin gowns, top hats and goggles at Whitby this weekend as the town played host to a steampunk convention.

Hundreds of dramatically dressed fans of the genre descended on the North Yorkshire coastal resort for the bi-annual Whitby Steampunk Weekend, one of the largest in the UK.

But even the elaborate costumes and layers of waistcoats and corsets didn’t stop the attendees from the usual seaside pursuits of walking on the sand or queuing for fish and chips…

Fans of steampunk dress in a retro-futuristic style of the kind associated with Edwardian and Victorian science fiction, with nods to plague doctors, Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea and HG Wells’ Time Machine.