Exploring Liverpool Through the Lens: A Photographer’s Journey Beyond Portraits

Most of my work is portraits and headshots, but every so often it’s worth putting the studio lighting down and taking a walk through town with a camera instead. Liverpool doesn’t make that hard — historic architecture, contemporary landmarks, and street scenes that change every few months, all within a couple of miles of each other.

Rediscovering Liverpool one frame at a time

The waterfront is the obvious start: the Three Graces catch the golden hour beautifully, and the Mersey gives you a reflective surface that does half the composition work for you. But the city’s more interesting texture is inland — the street art around the Baltic Triangle and Ropewalks shifts constantly, and the contrast between somewhere like Mathew Street, home to the Cavern Club, and the modern lines of the Museum of Liverpool sums up the city better than either could alone.

How I approach it

Shooting a city is a different exercise to shooting a person. I’m looking for angles on familiar landmarks that most people walk straight past — the Liver Building from an unusual position, a street scene framed through a gap between buildings. Light does most of the heavy lifting, which is why I favour the golden hours around sunrise and sunset, when ordinary scenes pick up a warmth and depth they don’t have at midday.

Candid shots of people going about their day add life that empty streets can’t — a busker on Bold Street, two friends laughing over coffee. And the textures of the city itself, weathered brick, polished glass, cobblestones, are worth slowing down for even when there’s no obvious subject in frame.

Why it’s worth doing

Portrait photography is still my main focus, but urban photography keeps me honest about the bigger story a city tells. Liverpool changes fast, and photographing it now is partly about preserving what it looks like today for whoever looks back at these images later.

A few spots worth exploring

For a shorter, more focused list, see five of my favourite photo spots in Liverpool.

• Albert Dock — historic waterfront views, museums, restaurants
• Baltic Triangle — street art, creative spaces, quirky venues
• St George’s Hall — grand, historic, architecturally striking
• Crosby Beach — home to Antony Gormley’s “Another Place”
• Liverpool Cathedral — panoramic views from the tower

If you’re a fellow photographer, it’s worth stepping outside your usual genre now and then. And if you live here or you’re visiting, take a walk with a camera — Liverpool tends to reward the attempt. For more of my work, visit leonbritton.com or find me on Instagram @leonbrittonphotography.