The Beauty Of Abandoned Buildings That I Photographed In France

The photos have been taken in the past 5 years of exploring and photographing abandoned buildings in France. The buildings you see in the photos have a wide range regarding their purpose. They’ve been, for example, homes, churches, hospitals, castles and transportation.

Some places were obviously harder to visit than the others. Most of these buildings were found in the parks, everything was open and no-one was looking after it anymore. Some of the buildings, however, required me to carefully plan where and when to park my car, walk across a park, climb into an open window or crawl through a hole. It’s not always easy but I would use an entrance that’s already there. When a building is closed, it’s closed and I move on to the next one. That’s part of the game.

France has a lovely architecture and history which fascinates me. That’s one of the reasons why I love shooting abandoned buildings in this country. Funny thing is that there is a noticeable difference between the Northern part of the country and the Southern part.

Personally, I enjoy exploring the Southern part more. Roads seem to be wider, there seem to be fewer people and there is definitely more sun. Buildings are just as beautiful as in the North though. The North is more accessible for me. Interestingly enough some of the buildings in the photos have either been destroyed or are in renovation. For example, the beautiful chapel with plants on the floor is undergoing renovation works. The cloister has been damaged heavily recently and is undergoing repairs. The church with debris on the floor has unfortunately collapsed.

I currently use a Sony A7Rii with a 16-32mm wide-angle Zeiss lens, and a 24-70mm zoom Zeiss lens. In the past I’ve been shooting with a Canon EOS 650d and a 10-18mm Canon wide-angle lens. When shooting abandoned buildings, I mostly use my wide-angle to try and capture as much of the room as possible.

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