Country Life Magazine’s frontispiece, often referred to as the ‘Girls in pearl’, ‘babe of the week’ or ‘English rose’, is arguably one of the first pages people reach for when opening the magazine. Originally this was a means of introducing young women into Society, portraying members of the aristocracy, but it has developed to celebrate engagements, achievements, new career choices, charity endeavours and so on.
It is the variety of styles, not just in the photography, but the clothing & composition that interests me so much the frontispiece. One day you will find a beautifully lit close up portrait, another you’ll find a girl in green leaning out of a yellow digger, or as in this issue’s case, in gold standing in a round ball on a large lawn in Hampshire! My preference lies with the more quirky shots and this is one of my recent favourites.
Thank you to the stunning Victoria Gibbs for making the shoot such fun, Avington Park for providing a spectacular location and Mach Management for their wonderful make up.
A real honour to photograph Norman Scott for the Times article, 12th April 2018. The full story, beautifully penned by Helen Rumbelow, is available on the Times website.
Norman’s incredible story about his then scandalous affair with Jeremy Thorpe in 1970’s, and his attempted assassination has been made into a BBC series, A Very English Scandal, due out shortly. It boasts Ben Whishaw as Norman and Hugh Grant as Jeremy and promises to as moving as it is gripping. Having heard so much of Norman’s story first hand, I can’t wait to see it.
Dogs and horses play a strong part in Norman’s life in Devon – indeed it was his dog Rinka who took the bullet instead of Norman on the chilling night of his attempted assassination on Exmoor. So it seemed only fitting to photograph Norman with one of his many dogs for this portrait, in this case Pugsy, a rescue dog from a holiday in Cyprus.
This portrait of Trudie Styler for Country Life Magazine’s feature on Irish Wolfhounds, was taken at Trudie and Sting’s residence in Wiltshire on a filthy winter’s day in December.
Portrait photography in the rain is always a challenge. Standing in a fast running river with water flowing in over the brim of my wellies, Lucy precariously holding my lighting in strong gusts of wind, 6 irish wolfounds on a bridge eyeing up potential fun in the water below, all whilst being overlooked by Sting – made it all the more exciting! Trudie also had her hands full with these enormous hounds so I’m not sure who was more relieved when all the elements came together within a few minutes and we captured the shot without any of the wolfhounds joining Lucy and I for a splash!
One of the many things I love about my job is returning to photograph the same children and families over the course of many years. I have been photographing these siblings every 2-3 years for over 15 years – now with a pretty unbeatable collection of A* A’Levels and GCSEs behind them, they were a far cry from the little rascals I photographed in my studio in London aged 4 and 2 years old!
I love the composition of this image – the sister on the fence smiling down at her younger brother, both looking happy, relaxed and confident, framed within the urban context in which they have grown up.
As a mother of three daughters myself, I love photographing girls.
There was something so special about these two sisters (aside from both being naturally beautiful and photogenic). A combination of their contagiously happy spirit, gentle confidence, humility, kindness, and deep routed love for each other. Whilst I captured a variety of stunning portraits of the two of them together (and individually), this image epitomises their relationship. The subjects don’t have to be looking into the your eye to capture your attention – a moment can be every bit as powerful. This was a moment for me.
Very honoured to have met and photographing this inspiring young lady – Sophie Montagne. As covered recently on the BBC news, Sophie is part of the first all female team attempting to cross Antartica later in November this year. The team has just returned from 3 weeks training in the Norwegian Wilderness, where they have skied 463km and climbed over 6000m, pulling 50kg behind them (about 75% of their bodyweight).
In November, their 3 month journey will be cover 1,700km during which they will be battling temperatures of -50C with wind speeds over 60mph. Some feat. Follow them on twitter @exicemaiden.
