Friday Night Confessionals.......2021 International Women's Day

This year……ZOOM ruled

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As International Women’s Day approached this year I had been spending this lockdown online studying my other passion, Yoga Teaching. The love and happiness that flowed out of the screens during class was phenomenal.

I pondered ways to celebrate and appreciate this when it occurred to me we were graduating the day before on March 7th so I asked if anyone would love to be involved and created the #choosetochallenge images for the IWD Gallery and some additional images for fun :-)

Totally amazed it worked and beyond thrilled these amazing souls below were up to experiment and see what would happen, we laughed A LOT and created some beautiful images. Thank You everyone xx My heart is FULL xx

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Friday night Confessionals….For the love of Peonies

Juicy Fridays….

Hi!! How is everyone doing?? February already and I’ve been armpit deep in training since the beginning of the year, which has been amazing and super intense, a part of me wondered why this was such a great idea during a pandemic lol but this quote from it has really resonated

‘Ironed out in the FIRE’

YES! So today, rain outside, a need within to be creative, so many ideas brewing and a pot of delicious gold paint calling….

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Ahaaaaaa……Oh I’m super excited I had the chance to explore something that’s been tickling me for about a week but I hadn’t had the chance to act on it until, the tickle got too much today and I busted out my art box, brushes, paints, peony images, lay newspaper down and tapped my imagination.

Different brush sizes and textures later I started adding gold shimmer to a test image from my Peony portfolio : luscious fine art paper!! I’ve lots more exploration but I’m excited by this start :-)

Here’s to creative weekends ahead!! Have a great one!! x

Friday afternoon confessionals....lockdown day 9

(We won’t mention it’s also Friday 13th lol)

so Same, same but different…..

This lockdown is different, it doesn’t feel the same, parts of it seem familiar, but it’s just enough to feel slightly odd too - is that even possible with how this year is running? Actually amongst all this I feel hopeful and elated after the weekend election results, I also feel relieved, but, hopeful, mainly hopeful. So as we ride through our second lockdown, it’s been pretty eventful this week.

Monday afternoon I took a friend to A&E, LUCKILY she is ok and we returned home with a Wagas takeout (separate homes/masks worn in the car/ sanitised everything). Tuesday was my birthday - I’ve never solo walked with friends at a distance so much in one day and eaten lunch al fresco in November - it was fabulous! I ALSO threw on (haha as if that was even possible) shoe horned my ass in to my gold hot pants not worn in public since 2013 and if a girl can’t wear a sparkle on her birthday when can she wear it? My future self will thank me for it I am certain :-)

Wednesday I woke up feeling like hell, it wasn’t a hangover, not a drop of fizz has passed my lips for a while! I returned to bed until mid afternoon when I decided to investigate the nearest drive in testing spot - off I went, cotton swab wafted to the back of my throat + up my right nostril, I spent 10 seconds trying not to giggle as it was ridiculously ticklish + when else would you discover there’s a spot right up your nose that tickles? I’m grateful my result was negative. Still feeling exhausted I took a little walk around the block today taking in the sunny air then promptly returned home to soup and lots of water. So Friday here we are. The week has flown yet I’ve been super elated by all the awesome friends I have that sang happy birthday in varying tones through whatsapp/facebook/text - the flowers that arrived yesterday/ the hamper of goodies/ gifts of candles/treats/relaxation. For a lockdown birthday week it’s been pretty wonderful in so many unexpected ways + once my energy levels lift I’ll be back to world domination, for now I’m off to read + nap.

Stay safe everyone, BIG LOVE Jxx

Lockdown birthday 101 - wear sparkle and embrace it with a pout, socially distanced friend + sunshine x

Lockdown birthday 101 - wear sparkle and embrace it with a pout, socially distanced friend + sunshine x

Friday Night Confessionals….it’s 9pm… where did today go?

I’m writing this wondering quite where this week flew to?

Just a short ditty this evening :-) I’ve kept up my twice daily walks taking in the early morning bird song - bliss, rolling fields, peace and fresh air + loved pottering around my garden, dead heading my fucias, tending to the gooseberries, cucumber + tomatoes in between work.

It has felt slightly unnerving seeing so many people around as I rejoin society and in the heat of Thursday my mask became a sauna - very good for the skin I’m sure!! Lol

So as this week draws out and the weekend begins I want to wish you all a wonderful sunny one xx

Weekend confessionals - raw imagery

Lockdown diaries / keeping sane in the time of COVID


OK so believe me when I say THESE ARE NOT the finished article, they are a work in progress and proof of a ‘breakthrough’ (small gains)


I’m not the kind of person to share something until the journey is complete and you can look back and reflect, order the highs and lows and make sense of the process but here I find myself sharing this work in its raw form for the reason that I am relieved to ACTUALLY SEE SOMETHING


It’s been weird and strange not photographing clients and so to keep my sanity I started photographing my daily walk. I dug out my Hasselblad and loaded it with film, I made a photo diary of developing + re acquainting myself with a process I hadn’t touched in years and then I hit a wall. My scanner didn’t scan 120 negs, I couldn’t ‘see’ what I was shooting, I felt blind. Unsure my light meter, camera, self was working. I’m a problem solver but I was stumped. I sat on the problem searching for a solution wanting desperately to see.
Tonight after trying, frustratedly giving up, talking to one of my oldest friends and then trying again I FINALLY SAW SOMETHING!


My film negs taped to my window shot on my phone, twisted in some weird app I see the community I have been capturing, the souls who have tirelessly worked to keep life going.
The teachers at the local primary school preparing for two year groups to return
Wendy from Porters who has worked relentlessly throughout
Judith a student of mine who has made scrubs for the local hospital
Simon who turned a tea room into a general store for his village + many more + One day I’ll see them all

Friday Afternoon Confessionals.....

Two weeks ago I landed in Boston, One week ago I landed back in London, when things move rapidly, all we can do is hang on and try our best to navigate the ride!

This afternoon as I write this, looking out at the sunshine, blue sky and peacefulness, I am 100% sure everyone everywhere is still feeling the surreal-ness of the situations we are adjusting to - I’m not going to harness that, instead I’m sharing my trip back to Maine, the walks I took in nature + the portraits at a distance I created + a couple of shots from my phone of the amazing colours I’m seeing on my daily walks x

So Maine, my spiritual haven, hmmm perhaps better to say my photographic haven where the photo magic first happened. A workshop back at my old school with my fabulous professor learning carbon transfer printing.

All the info I had read ahead of class told me just how tricky it was - AND IT IS!! BUT it was also really wonderful to be connecting with the photographic process and craft back in the dark room after quite a long time away. I used one of my images of one of my brides + for a first attempt it has encouraged me to experiment further when the time is right and to take this process and see where it takes me…….

This trip also enabled me to get back in to deep nature and embrace the sea air and sunsets!!! The light has always been magical in Maine and now home on my evening walks I am also seeing slithers of it here too :-)

I also had EVERY INTENTION of continuing my International Women’s Day project photographing friends and I people I knew with the theme ‘friendship’ . With lock down swift in America I respectfully kept my distance from the two ladies I had the opportunity to photograph and above is ‘Pam’ my airbnb host. When I return I’ll photograph the others I didn’t catch on this trip :-) but it was great to even capture these!!

And so to home. Just on my iphone but maybe I’m being more vigilant, a bit more aware of my surroundings but I am loving the colours that are appearing in the evenings, soft tones and hues, pastels and patches of light highlighting the landscape that would in the past not necessarily caught my attention…..maybe I brought a bit of the magic back with me…stay safe + healthy everyone!! xx

International Women's Day 2020

Celebrating ‘Friendship’

March 2020

I couldn’t let this year pass without celebrating - every year I capture portraits of women which then become an exhibition with the idea of inspiring younger generations.

This year the arts project in Croydon is taking a break + I thought it would be great to do something a little more casual with the end results being shared online during the day of International Women’s Day. I set about thinking of friends who work in central London so I could be in one spot and it wouldn’t be too tricky for them to come to me with the theme ‘friendship’ + ask them for their own interpretation, feeling, word, colour - whatever it was that resonates with them.

  • so Friday 6th these gorgeous ladies below swung by for chatter, tea, pictures + let me take their photo.

I also had in my mind that I’m trying something new….challenging myself + stepping out of my comfort zone to shoot in a different way, to step back slightly, to allow the images to sit together, to continue for the month of March, to include portraits where the sitter isn’t smiling - I CANNOT even BEGIN to tell you HOW HARD that was!!! + produce a lovely project + as it turned out, was a very poignant theme.

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Above a screen shot of my final selection of images, Below the final cut (or so I thought!)

I loved how everyone’s response was very different.

I wanted to bring people together with this project, to share their individual interpretation of “friendship” + to create portraits where I challenged myself in the image making. I am really good at getting right up close to people and in to their space to capture their essence + to be honest this has turned in to a process of challenging normality for me, for sitting on my own hands when I wanted to move in closer or select the happiest photo in the selection + publish on socials only my finely curated selection of happy.

What transpired was me forcing myself to choose images I loved but were perhaps a little more sullen than my usual work. Not soley to challenge myself but to look at the images with a different perspective, a different vantage point. That in itself challenged me to let go and reconnect to being happy with the images myself, whichever ones I chose + trusting the ‘process’.

It’s also been about a conversation Tanya and I had about the viewers experience and ‘seeing’ as the artist or photographer was at the precise moment in time and layering on top of that what we bring in the form of our own interpretation/feelings/emotions/life events to any art at any given moment.

My normal way of working is interacting, observing, creating ease between me, my camera and my sitter, recording just the right representation that I see in any given moment that I feel is an accurate representation of them - on Friday, I stepped back, I deliberately created space to see if it impacted the images I created, if it brought something else forward. So a project based on friendship and exploring how we see.

It’s interesting that looking through the selected images of each of my friends , the versatility of their emotions and our conversation serves as a great mixture to capture slightly different feelings in each picture + the selections below are to appease my controlling mind and show the fun we had!! :-) They also work really nicely as a set of images.

I’m continuing this project and excited to capture more friends through March - over on instagram you can also hear everyone’s interpretation of ‘friendship’ . Have a fab March + enjoy x

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Friday Night Confessionals

Friday turns in to Saturday

I had every intention to post last night, to sit down and enjoy writing about the week, Andrea + Wes’s beautiful proposal + finish off Friday, sunny side up - but when it came to it, words just weren’t there and I didn’t want to half ass it.

So here I am fresh as a daisy - Saturday morning after two photo sessions in London, sun is shinning + I’m heading home to my first Xmas party of the season! I’m very excited, it’s bowling and mince pies - what’s not to love!!

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I worked with Wes to pick the perfect spot for him to propose to Andrea a few weeks ahead of their trip to London. We planned our interaction, me casually offering to take a photo of them and bosh, Wes got down on one knee and Hey Presto!

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Following the shock, delight and utter happiness, we continued creating engagement pictures around St.Dunstans before walking along to The Tower of London + Tower Bridge where the light was super pretty (the north side of the river is always dreamy to photograph at in good weather as the sun rises the other side).

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We found lots of fun doorways and textures to mid in with the epic iconic backdrops London has to offer and had so much fun!

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If you’re planning a trip to London or a proposal over Christmas, do drop me a DM or call to discuss your plans and ideas + I’ll take it from there!