A walk in Manchester

April 27, 2017April 26, 2017 / mikeosbornphoto / 17 Comments

The canal path linking my Manchester community of Castlefield to the heart of the city recently opened up again. I explored its length for the first time since moving north. Its dark stretches can be a little daunting and desolate, while areas of the Rochdale Canal need tidying up.

But this waterside walk takes you past the back side of some of Manchester’s powerful industrial buildings and recent musical heritage. It’s a route to the Northern Quarter – a grungy, vibrant place full of life and youthful businesses. This was a great northern photo walk with plenty to capture…

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Eastern lovelocks

November 29, 2015November 29, 2015 / mikeosbornphoto / 10 Comments

Hundreds of padlocks, attached to a strip of fence close to Shoreditch High Street rail station to the east of the city of London. This isn’t my first brush with lovelocks, permanent little emblems of relationships left in public places. Each lock tells a story – or at least hints at one – and are intriguing to take as individual, close-up photographs. A whole swathe of these brings delicious focusing to the fore and an explosion of colour.

As a contrast to the intimacy of the lovelocks, I took a photograph of the view from the fence – the urban grit of the Braithwaite Street tunnel and a host of pedestrians. Who knows, maybe a pair of them had snapped on a lock just minutes before…

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Lovelocks

April 6, 2014April 6, 2014 / mikeosbornphoto / 12 Comments

After a recent visit to London’s Tate Modern art gallery, I took the walk across the Millennium Bridge towards St Paul’s Cathedral.

It wasn’t the views across the Thames or swarms of tourists that caught my eye, but a number of little metal objects dangling from the cables of the bridge.

Padlocks. Locked up and left to their fate, many of them carrying messages of love and probably youthful union. Lovelocks.

I haven’t seen them in London before, although in other places around the world they’re commonplace. The Pont des Arts in Paris is groaning under the weight of thousands of locks, prompting a campaign to ban the practice.

There are just a handful on this bridge, little tokens of unbreakable relationships which are probably forgotten soon after they’ve been fixed to the spot.

Vandalism or litter they might be, but small human moments that are a pleasure to capture.