Garden abstraction

July 5, 2014 / mikeosbornphoto / 9 Comments

This is a story of lazing in a neat, suburban garden. It’s bounded on all sides by fences and is carefully sculpted. The sun beats down and you screw up your eyes to combat the glare.

You see a series of abstract moments, unusual visions from the corners of your eyes. Little corners that invade your being from the inactivity of the day. And the sunlight plays on the conventional parameters of this garden to conjure up dreams of a languid summer day in this garden…

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Beach huts

December 21, 2013December 21, 2013 / mikeosbornphoto / 24 Comments

They’re a traditional, essential and practically iconic feature of the British seaside. It’s a shelter, somewhere to change into your bathing costume, a place to make a cup of tea.

The coastal resort of Bournemouth in Dorset, on England’s south coast, is a bastion of the beach hut. The first municipal beach huts were built there in 1909, and there are still hundreds of them there today.

Long lines of little dwellings in every imaginable colour are a sight to behold on a chilly December day. They’re mostly locked up for the winter, but a couple of hardy souls were sat outside their miniature English castle.

They are irresistible to photograph – and this is a collection that simply cannot be presented in monochrome.

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Beach huts in the Kent seaside town of Whitstable

Southerly skies

December 14, 2013December 14, 2013 / mikeosbornphoto / 12 Comments

Dermot hatched a plan for a London escape, just for a day. We travelled to Bournemouth, a resort on the south coast, past the port of Southampton and the Isle of Wight.

It was his first time, it was an occasion for childhood holiday memories for me. The December day was far from freezing. The sun did its best to pierce through, occasionally there was drizzle.

The sky over the expanse of the English Channel was dramatic and compelling, invigorating and interesting…

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British sea power

November 17, 2013November 23, 2013 / mikeosbornphoto / 11 Comments

A bracing day on England’s south-east coast. Bright skies, brilliant sunshine cut deep with November chill.

The sea is tempestuous, bringing brown waves crashing onto Whitstable beach and throwing white spray against the sturdy groynes.

My instinct is to get as close as possible. The camera lens becomes flecked with salt as I capture some of this invigorating power, which reaches out to me as well. It is a world far away from the city’s enclosure.

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Seaside signs

November 16, 2013November 23, 2013 / mikeosbornphoto / 7 Comments

The Kent seaside town of Whitstable bristles with signs. Signs that glint in the bright sunshine of a November day.

One grandly pronounces the resort’s long and proud connection with oysters, while a lifeguard hut pulses its dazzling red and yellow presence.

Elsewhere, the faded elegance of a hotel and the name of an old house near the shore are announced to all. Little pieces of history, just a few fragments of a British coastal beacon.