Our latest feature is a lovely travel story from film photographer Juliet Schwab. Juliet takes us through the streets of Rome and captures the beautiful city on both 35mm and medium format film. Here is more from Juliet about her time in Italy…
My husband and I met in Rome as study abroad students seventeen years ago, and we recently returned to the Eternal City the week after Christmas. We had never been there in the winter and didn’t know what to expect, but we found the weather to be sunny and mild. The city was full of tourists and Romans enjoying the sites and sitting outside at cafes and restaurants.
It’s hard to photograph the way I feel in Rome, which is a city I know and love well, but in these images I tried to capture a sense of the city’s history and art as well as the life of its markets, streets, and piazzas.
Over the years, Romans have incorporated old materials into new buildings, built layers upon layers, and gone about their daily lives surrounded by their material history. I really love how everywhere you go in Rome, you are passing over and through all these layers that exist simultaneously. It’s a beautiful city that one can appreciate without knowing all its history, but knowing something of it enriches the experience.
On this trip, we struck just the right balance between sightseeing and eating, activity, and rest, and I hope we don’t wait another seventeen years to go back. Rome is a city I will always love getting to know more.
Analog cameras and films used: Olympus OM-1 (Find at KEH Camera or on eBay), Rolleiflex Automat MX (Find at KEH Camera or on eBay) | Kodak Portra 400 (Find on Amazon), Kodak Tri-X 400 (Find on Amazon)
Connect with Juliet: Website | Instagram
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