My time at college was a total indulgence in all things photography. Although I had access to several darkrooms at college, I continued printing at home as I couldn’t get enough of this amazing process.

I never kept up fishing or skateboarding but continued with cycling. Here I am racing with the Port Sunlight Wheelers in 1985 around Birkenhead Park. I can’t remember if I was at the back or the front of the peloton?!

While at college, I met up with an old school and skateboarding friend and he introduced me to the great outdoors. I was no stranger to being outdoors having spent years sitting in all sorts of weather fishing with my Dad, but John got me interested in walking. I had to borrow a pair of boots and a rucksack and we headed up Moel Famau in Wales. At the top, John got out a gas stove and heated up a tin of tomato soup. It was the best soup I’d ever had! Any food cooked outside, especially in the hills, always tastes better, don’t you think? As soon as I could afford to, I bought my own boots, rucksack and stove and I was off into the hills!

*1963, me and my Brother Rob. Rob has always been very enterprising and I can see him already weighing me up as a future employee!*

After graduating from college in 1980 I worked as a darkroom technician in Liverpool and then as a photographer in Birkenhead with a group of visual & performing artists. In 1986 I headed to London to train as a wedding photographer and worked there for two years before moving to Northampton. I had a full time job there as a darkroom manager for a busy commercial lab but continued to photograph weddings at the weekends. After seven very busy years working in management, I needed a change of career, so I moved to West Yorkshire in 1995 and trained to be a Dispensing Optician.

My brother Rob ran his own business and I worked for him as a Dispensing Optician for nine years. I enjoyed the challenge of studying again and qualified in 1998. During this time I met Sarah. We both share a love of walking and being outdoors particularly in the Lake District. So in 2000, in a small pub in the Lake District with a handful of guests, we got married. We decided I should photograph our wedding myself! I used an old twin lens reflex camera loaded with black & white film and I printed all the images in my darkroom.

In 2004 I decided to leave the security of employment and head into the unknown world of being a self-employed landscape photographer. This wasn’t an easy career being an artist selling prints, but I loved being in the landscape and sharing my images. I had two successful solo exhibitions of my work at the Dean Clough Galleries, Halifax and at John Ruskin’s Brantwood, Coniston. As hard as it was, with my love for the great outdoors and photography, I knew I couldn’t do anything else.

After a fully committed career in the NHS, Sarah decided to leave and study horticulture. We soon found ourselves leaving our beloved home in West Yorkshire and headed to Scotland for a year where she completed her training with the National Trust for Scotland.

*2000, our wedding at the Bower House Inn, Eskdale. Mum & Dad at our wedding picnic on the shore of Wastwater, the Lake District.*

*Sarah (centre) with her sister and Mum at our wedding picnic on the shore of Wastwater, the Lake District.*

In 2009 we moved to Cumbria and rented a cottage on the Holker Hall Estate. Sarah quickly settled into a career of gardening and I decided I needed something to supplement my income from landscape photography, so I trained as a picture framer and opened my own workshop in Windermere.

We knew Cumbria was going to be our home so we bought a house and settled in Grange-over-Sands. Having a bit more space in our new house, I moved my framing workshop there and continued framing for my customers until I turned sixty and decided it was time to draw on my personal pension!

In my next blog post I’ll write some more about where I am today.

Cheers,
David.

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Where It All Began