The cloud had been sitting on the mountains all morning like a hat pulled down over its eyes, and then for about fifteen minutes the sun broke through low and side-on and set the entire rock face above Gougane Barra on fire. The golds and ambers were almost absurd. It was the kind of light…

There was a single boat on our little corner of the Lakes of Killarney. I’d walked down from O’Sullivan’s Cascade to join other photographers from Blarney Photography Club. They were busy photographing the same scene you see here and everything around them. We were enjoying the afternoon sunlight on a calm October day last year.

Someone chose to put two Union Jack armchairs and an exercise ball in their office window for all of London to see. I spotted this walking past an office block and the arrangement stopped me mid-stride. The chairs are proper wingbacks, upholstered in full flag regalia, flanking a slightly deflated-looking exercise ball that’s doing its…

Cork’s Pope Quay packs more character into two hundred metres than most cities manage in a mile. I was standing on the south bank with the River Lee between us, drawn initially by the sweep of that pedestrian footbridge. It’s a clean, modern arc that sits surprisingly well against the jumble of modern, Georgian and…

Fist in the air, beer in the other hand, in defiance of the rain that had been hammering down earlier. This is Las Fallas distilled into two men and a moment. I caught them mid-chant on one of the streets near the Plaza del Ayuntamiento. The man on the left had gone full traditional, with…

A pigeon had taken up residence in the Dubray Books window on St. Patrick Street, wedged comfortably between Michael Palin and a Lonely Planet guide which is frankly better taste in travel literature than most of us manage. It sat there among the carefully arranged display like it had been hired for the job, unbothered…

A Hyundai sat brazenly on the double yellows outside Dunnes on Drawbridge Street, and behind the wheel, well, behind the steering wheel at least, sat this absolute unit of a security detail. Blue jumper on, mouth open, eyes locked on mine like I’d just tried the door handle. The owner had clearly nipped into the…

The Atlantic was absolutely hammering Clogher Beach when I got down there a few weeks ago. A proper winter swell rolling in through the gap between the headlands, each wave stacking up and throwing that incredible translucent green you only get when the light catches the water from behind. An Fear Marbh sat out there…

The cold at Cappagh Beach the morning I made this photo was the sort that makes you question every life choice that led you to a dark car park before dawn. The sunrise wasn’t that great but shortly before we left, the sun cracked through a gap in the cloud and turned the entire Atlantic…

A street cleaner with a bin bag in one hand, framed between a STOP sign and a no-right-turn sign. You couldn’t stage it better. I shot this from Drawbridge Street, watching the lunchtime crowd flow past him like water around a rock. What struck me was the contrast: dozens of people mid-stride, shopping or wandering…

Late afternoon sun hit Castle Street at just the right angle and turned the whole scene outside The Roundy into something cinematic. The outside area of the pub was packed with people drinking and enjoying the afternoon and soaking up the kind of Cork sunshine you never quite trust to last. The lens flare flooding…

A hand went up three rows ahead of me and suddenly I had my shot. The Undertones were tearing through their set at Cyprus Avenue in Cork, the stage lights throwing fat circles of purple and magenta across the room, and this person decided twenty seconds of shaky phone footage was worth the effort. It…