Opal Of The West

In October 2021 my commercial work took me to The Royal Oak pub in Blackpool. I’m shooting a series of films for a sports brand that takes me to locations across the north of England. Small towns, salt of the earth people. Humble, honest, unapologetic. In each place I visit, time and again I see the same thing. It almost takes me by surprise: they’re…happy. Unpretentious, straight-talking and astute. Like many working class towns post pandemic, people were coming to terms with the new world and promises of leveling up and a fairer distribution of wealth from the Government. The so-called ‘closing the gap’ on the disparity between the North and South, rhetoric spouted to breath optimism into the confused, the needy, the worn down. The working classes have always gone about their business, relying only on themselves and their communities. Never expecting anything, and this time is no different. They’re not interested in the politics & promises from the capital that so many of us clung on to for so long. Used to the bullshit, used to being left behind, they are getting on by getting on. When my shoot wrapped up, I stayed for a few hours chatting with the locals in the Royal Oak. Trading laughs and stories about family, home, the future and life in general. I’m a people person, and before long our conversations turn into me capturing portraits of some of the locals in the pub. Growing up as a Northern lad, Blackpool always had a special place in my heart. Fond memories of weekend trips and seaside vacations to the Town with my parents, a place that was once so vibrant and buzzing with tourism. I have always been fascinated by the work of photographers like Martin Parr and Tom Wood, who capture the so-called everyday and mundane. The old saying goes, that everyone has a story to tell and this was certainly the case of those people I met that day on my shoot in Blackpool. I wanted to create a Martin Parr photobook that could live, breathe, talk and share their stories, that is were the idea for Opal of the West was born.

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