Along with her sister Rita Martin, she was one of the most commercially successful women portraitists of the early 20th century.

[6] The following year, Charles moved to 39A Curzon Street, where she became the "foremost female portrait photographer of her day".

[7] One of her portraits of a young girl was coloured and used as the cover image for the first issue of The Royal Magazine published by Sir Arthur Pearson in November 1898.

Other pioneer women photographers of her time, other than her sister, were: Christina Broom, Kate Pragnell and Lizzie Caswall Smith.

[9] Mme Yevonde was an apprentice of Charles, and Cecil Beaton, as a young man, posed for a family portrait, an experience he described in his book Photobiography.