Someone recently asked what I did for my work. When I told him I did travel photography and baking he looked rather puzzled and surprised before commenting, “There must be a venn diagram for that somewhere.”
Up close with the wildlife of South America aged 14.
Long before Bake Off came along though photography was always plan A. When I was 14 I had a year in Chile and in that year I realised thatbeing a travel photographer waswhat I wanted to be. This dream was enforced when a picture from that year of a seal and it’s pup got to the semi-final of the Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year Award.
Since that year I have doggedly held onto that dream. It hasn’t always been easy and during the early years of my career I had to do other jobs such as being a cycle courier in London to try and make ends meet. Fortunately I had two lucky breaks relatively early on: the first was working for a trekking company in the Himalayas in India for a couple of summers and the second was a complete contrast out in Jamaica taking pictures for Air Jamaica’s in-flight magazine.
In the foothills of the Indian Himalayas
From the work in India I then moved across the Himalayas and ended up making Tibet one of my specialist areas for photography. This ultimately lead to photographing His Holiness the Dalai Lama in India which in turn lead to me becoming his photographer whenever he came to London. A huge honour that not only took me backstage at many events and meeting numerous politicians as well as PrinceCharles but also for me to share unique quiet moments when he was meeting old friends in his hotel room.
The work in Jamaica spread out across the Caribbean and beyong not only through Air Jamaica’s network but to other jobs for many clients including Rough Guides, Barclays Bank, The Sunday Times, The Observer, First Choice, Thomson and TUI. As I travelled I also shot a huge amount of stock photography that currently sits in Getty Images, Axiom and many other libraries. Sadly the good old days of making a living from that seem to have passed but I still shoot away whenever I have the chance.
These days however my life is more of a juggle between a young family, an old house, photography and of course baking. I love them all but I sometimes feel like the pushmi-pullyu from Dr Dolittle as I am tugged in all sorts of directions!
Lola Wiebe
August 06, 2019My husband and I have very much enjoyed watching the British Baking Show-we are rewatching previous seasons now-wishing the format had stayed the same. We enjoyed seeing your creations, and thought you had a very nice manner about you throughout. Thank you for putting up your carrot cake recipe-going to give it a try!