Brighton

The West Pier in Brighton closed in 1975, and soon fell into disrepair. Back when I was at college in Gloucester in the 1980s, a fellow student managed to gain access to the already-crumbling remains and took an interesting set of fashion photos. The pier’s decline ever since, hastened by a couple of fires in 2003, has long been documented by landscape photographers - anyone who has ever looked at the results of the long-running Landscape Photographer of the Year competition can attest to its popularity as a subject. I’ve done car shoots on the seafront in Brighton before, but a visit to the town over February half-term gave me the opportunity to shoot some personal work at both the West Pier and the surviving Palace Pier.

Greenham Common

This was the last job that I did as an employee of Classic & Sports Car, after 26 years on the magazine’s staff. We were lucky to be granted access to the former USAF base at Greenham Common, famous as the home of cruise missiles back in the day. It was one of those rare days when the subject matter, the location and the weather all came together, the sort of day that makes you realize why you chose photography as a career. I drove home feeling that this was the end of one era, but hopefully the start of an exciting new one…