Eleven O’Clock
On 11 November most French communes stop for a wreath, a short speech and a roll call of the local dead. Then everyone goes home for lunch. I have stood at the other end of it, and I have been thinking about it since Normandy.
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The letter: October
October was supposed to be the quiet month before November. Instead there was a funeral in Brittany, the camera I learnt on in 1987 bought back for fifteen euros, and a day lost to working out what is actually happening in France.
ReadWhat is happening in France is a French story
A friend in the US asked what is going on in France. I live here, and I wanted to answer with facts rather than a feeling. This is the short version, and one request.
ReadFrance, October 2026: what is going on
A friend in the US asked me what is going on in France, so I spent a day checking what is known and what is only claimed. This is the long answer: the history, three popular claims tested against the evidence, and a dated list of what to watch next.
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Jean Paul Jacob, 1946 – 2026
I have written this article a thousand times in my head. Jean Paul Jacob was my father-in-law, and he taught me a lot of my French by arguing with me. This is the version that finally made it onto the page.
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Normandy, 1944 — All Sixteen
Two trips, seven years apart, and I only worked out this week that they were ever the same project. Sixteen photographs between Pegasus Bridge and Utah Beach, all in black and white now, all live in the shop.
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The Merville Battery
I went to the Merville Battery in August 2019, between Pegasus Bridge in the morning and the war cemetery at Ranville in the afternoon. I wrote about both of those and never wrote about this, and the photographs sat on a disk for seven years. This is the part of that day I had let go of.
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A Day in Paris with My Daughter: The Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, and 127 Floors
A day trip to Paris with my daughter Kate in July 2020 — the Louvre, the Pyramide Inversée, and more steps than anticipated. Shot on Fujifilm XT2. Republished six years on.
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Nantes, the green line
Seven years ago today, Killian and I followed a painted green line through Nantes for twelve kilometres. In thirty-six-degree heat. With a Canon 6D Mark II and no…
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Montjean-sur-Loire — The Wrong Road, the Right Place
I had no plan, no destination — just a car, a camera, and an afternoon to fill. I missed the bridge at Ancenis, ended up on the wrong road, and somehow landed at Montjean-sur-Loire with a river wider than I’d ever seen. The Canon 6D Mark II and I made the best of it.
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Clisson — A Guilty Pleasure
Clisson on a warm Wednesday in May. The medieval château, the weirs on the Sèvre Nantaise, the old stone bridge with its cross. A familiar town — but this time the film bag stayed at home. Instead: the Canon 6D Mark II, a 16–35mm, a 24–70mm, a 70–300mm, and the nagging question of whether producing this many good images this easily is something to be proud of.
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La Rabatelière: Month of Our Lady
May 1st: the first day of the Month of Our Lady. I loaded the Canon AE1 Program with Fomapan 100 and drove to La Rabatelière to photograph the Sanctuaire de la Salette. What I found was a burned church, an axe-marked door, a miller’s millstone, and a hillside full of statues built in defiance of the Republic. The Vendée remembers.
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