Gone are the days of a career that spans the full working life of an individual, to be replaced with a much more flexible attitude to work and experience. In fact, these days if you have been in a job for any length of time, depending on the industry, you could be disadvantaged when applying for new jobs. Such is the nature of the employment market – it even extends to people having two or three ‘jobs’ simultaneously.
Those that have followed my career closely and known me since I started it, appreciate that I am not one for following tradition or the current ‘norm’. In fact I have done quite the reverse by being at the forefront of change and new directions, such as space planning in the late seventies and facilities management in the late eighties. For those, therefore, my announcement that I have started a new business in architectural photography, will not be a great surprise.
The reason for setting up an architectural photography business is not to compete with my facilities management consultancy, FM Scope, but rather to complement it. I have found in the past that, during the times I have tapped into my creativity through my photography it has inspired creativity in my facilities management and training roles.
From my university days in Edinburgh studying architecture, I have appreciated what the built environment has to offer by seeing rather than looking, by taking my eyes on a journey up, down and around, to the places that exist beyond eye level. I learned a long time ago that there many ways to view buildings and infrastructural elements – directly or indirectly, literally or figuratively.
My mission through photography, therefore, is to find and capture unique perspectives of our urban and interior landscapes. This is very much aligned with my FM mission: to introduce new concepts and tools to clients that will enable them to improve performance and capability and generally provide working environments that productively support their workers.
Sharing within the facilities management sector has not come easily in the past, but through the written word and presentations new concepts in ways of working and service delivery are being broadcast. I plan to reinforce these messages through my photography in a way that others will be inspired to follow and experiment.
I therefore consider my facilities management consultancy and my architectural photography to be very complementary, mutually inspiring and, in combination, capable of telling very strong stories.
There are two dimensions to my photography:
Commissioned photographic services for completed building and interior projects, through Martin Leitch Photography (www.martinleitchphotography.com)
Location centric, uniquely different and graphically inspiring stock images that don’t scream ‘stock photo’ through Graphic Cities (www.graphiccities.com).