The Artful Engineer

Our hotel in London was only a mile or two from Notting Hill, so one afternoon I spent a couple hours wandering the streets enjoying the architecture. It was a dreary day, but the resulting soft light was perfect for doors and windows and such, which are obviously a favored subject of mine whether they are in Arizona or Colorado or Greece.

I am very fond of straight-on shots that isolate individual doors—or even just parts of a door—but in Notting Hill there were a lot of nice stairways in front of them, so it was easy to vary my usual formula. I like the contrast between the left and right side of the image above. I have no idea why the stairs on the right are stained orange, and I know it has nothing to do with that pumpkin, but I am so glad that pumpkin was still there a solid month after Halloween.

The image below definitely exploits the symmetry of that bold white stripe that goes up the stairs, around the doorframe, and all the way back down. When I look at this image, I always find myself staring right at the brass mail slot.

Breaking away from the straight-on compositions, the rest of these images focus more on the stairs themselves. In this next image they are a supporting cast to the snowman, where the orange nose and scarf are the only relief in the somewhat gloomy color palette.

This next image is both vibrant and graphic. The steps themselves are hidden from view, and all that is left is strong diagonals and a small visual anchor in the form of damaged paint on the railing:

This next image is also graphic, but features the stairs themselves. I like the range of tones from the soft dark shadows under the railings to the glare on top of them:

Finally, we have this next rather garish paint choice. It is nice that the stairs are wet so the green reflects off of them. The single leaf provides a focal point, and the out-of-focus lamp in the upper-right corner balances the bit of glare in the bottom left corner. I really like this image: for as bold and graphic as it is, there are some nice subtleties. Not only the aforementioned reflections, but the streaks of dripping water. But as much as I like it, I doubt that I could convince my wife that it belongs on the wall.

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