Cities & Architecture

Le Comte de St Germain

*Le Comte de St Germain*
Fuji GW690iii + JCH400

Le Comte de St Germain is the costumed alter-ego of @walk.paris. He roams around Paris in his costume, unearthing tidbits of knowledge and trivia about the city. He was kind enough to walk me through the passages, glass covered arcades designed in the XIXth century to ferry bourgeois customers towards the Palais Royal, the largest « shopping mall » of the time. He is seen here giving a big f*ck you to the house of Adolphe Thiers, aka the butcher of the commune, the president who ordered the massacres that ended the 1871 revolution in France. If you have any interest in Paris at all you could do worse than follow him on Facebook or Instagram!

Notre Dame du Travail

*Notre Dame du Travail*
Fuji x100F

In July I had the unexpected and unbelievable luck of being able to visit a Parisian church at night. But not just any Parisian church: Notre Dame du Travail (Our Lady of Labour) is a 1902 building designed for working class labourers of the 14th arrondissement (I guess it wasn’t gentrified back then). The structure is Eiffel style, with metallic beams and columns, and it’s just visually stunning.

Iron Teeth

*Iron Teeth*
Rolleiflex SL35 + Ferrania P30

I love Hong Kong iron curtains. Many shops have these, some are very ornate, others, like this one here, as simpler. Few however have a set of jagged teeth like this one has (although only on certains days and at a certain time).

Latticed

*Latticed*
Rolleiflex SL35 + Ferrania P30

Ever since I started photography seriously I have been fascinated with doors: old doors, unusual doors, ornate doors… I don’t quite know why, the idea of entering or exiting probably speaks to me on an unconscious level. A few months ago I spent an afternoon in Cheung Chau and discovered plenty of doors worth looking into.

Galerie Vero Dodat


*Galerie Vero Dodat*
Fuji x100F

The galeries in Paris are covered streets, usually private, all leading towards the Palais Royal which was the commercial hub for high society in the XVIIIth and XIXth century. The architecture in these galleries is striking, as are the interplays of light and darkness. The galerie Vero Dodat was closed when I went on a Sunday, but I shot this through the barriers, and was quite pleased with how it came out.

Cardboard Stack

*Cardboard Stack*
Rollefliex SL35 + Lomography Fantome 8

I know this image is nothing to write home about, but it’s soooooo Hong Kong. I’ve not seen this kind of cardboard collection anywhere except here, so see it as a documentary photography (that’s my excuse for it being bland!)

Pawn Shop

 

*Pawn Shop*
Rolleiflex SL35 + Lomography Fantome 8

One of my favourite walls and sign in Hong Kong, the old pawn shop sign. The sign is designed to look like an upside down bat holding a coin. That is because, apparently, in cantonese where there are a lot of near homonyms (characters pronounced nearly the same with a slight tone variation), ‘upside down bat’ sounds virtually identical to ‘good fortune has arrived’!

Snail Mail

*Snail Mail*
Rolleiflex SL35 + Lomography Fantome 8

One of the things I love about Fantome 8 is that even mild contrasts between sun patches and shadow result in very dynamic images. In this picture I used that to my advantage by shooting my favourite Hong Kong feature: the iron store curtains!

Street Sign

 

*Street Sign*
Rolleiflex SL35 + Lomography Fantome 8

Hong Kong is filled with visual signage. In fact, you could say it’s overfilled with it, a proper assault on the senses. So it’s quite refreshing to see handwritten signs once in a while. No idea what this says though…

One More Tram

*One More Tram*
Rolleiflex SL35 + Lomography Fantome 8

I love trams in Hong Kong, but I often feel I’ve done them to death… Shooting with Fantome 8, I could only shoot high contrast and slow moving (or not moving) trams, and this one came out really nice. I love how it’s decorated.