Document and remember your life📸

Salut !

Do you like to document your day-to-day life through taking photos? I know I do! But this week I've pondered over my relationship with this question a bit more than usual. The reason is because I've started to experiment with taking photos with a small digital camera – and it's been quite fun!

Over the last few years, I've tried to find some sort of a balance between just enjoying the present moment with all of my senses, without looking at it through a lens, but also taking photos or videos of moments that I would like to look back on in a few years time. Overall I'd say that I'm taking way less photos now than before – focusing on their quality over quantity – and I like that it also means I have less clutter on my phone's camera roll. But still, it's almost a bit too easy take a bunch of photos with your phone and then forget about it as soon as you've taken them.

I was reminded of this option of carrying around a camera when I watched Ali Abdaal's recent video How To Slow Down Time – The Holiday Paradox, where he expressed how somehow taking photos with a separate camera feels more meaningful, and that it can help with remembering more moments of your life. Right after watching the video, I started to look at a nice pocket-sized cameras online that I could buy, but then realized that I already own a relatively small digital camera that could serve the purpose of this experiment.

So I took the camera with me the next day to work and snapped a couple of pictures of the pretty Parisian buildings in the early morning sun, then some other nice details that I saw during my commute to work, and I felt instantly more creative. As a matter of fact, it felt like an adventure. It encouraged me to look for interesting things in my surroundings and to not take too much photos of them – just focus, take 1-2 snaps, look at it once more, and move on. I admired the scene both with my own eyes and through the lens, so that if I want to reminisce the scenes of my day-to-day life that I lead in the fall of 2024 in the future, I'll have a stronger mental image of it and I can get back to it through the photos as well.

I suppose all of this is evident for photographers, but for me this felt like a new experiment. I was glad because I also got some fun photos of my friends when we spent the day on a beach in Normandy last Saturday, and because of it, the whole day felt much more cinematic and special. The photos I took weren't definitely anything extraordinary, but the point wasn't to try to be professional about it, but to just capture a few cute moments inconspicuously. And who knows if I keep doing this, I may become a better photographer as a side product as well.

If this sounds fun to you, I encourage you to try it! If you have an old digital camera lying around, take it with you and see if it makes your day-to-day life a bit more adventurous and creative. And try to see if you can find an easy way to transfer the photos to your phone after either via Wi-fi, Bluetooth or an SD card adapter.📲 It doesn't matter whether or not you feel like you're good at taking photos; just focus on noticing what your surroundings and the people around you look like, and I believe life will start to feel more memorable.

After all, it is quite cool that we now have the possibility to have this sort of footage of our lives. In the eras before the invention of photography, people could basically only document their lives through paintings and writing. Maybe the likes of Mozart for example would've liked to snap some pictures when he played for all of the royals and elite around Europe, but he couldn't. Of course we can have a full experience of life without looking at it through a lens, but it can also add some good vibes to our lives. And I'm all for some more good vibes in life!✨

Have a stylish week!

Bisous,

Elle

❣️Recent delights

• I'm not much of a pop music person but I happened to relisten to Niall Horan's song Flicker today, and for some reason it has always given me goose bumps, and so it did once again!
• As I've been so inspired by Ralph Lauren's life and work lately, you bet I watched the show of his new Spring 2025 collection that took place yesterday in Ralph's estate at the Hamptons. I loved all of the light blue tones of the collection, and especially the strapless sequined blue ombré evening gown in the beginning of the show – I just died when I saw it. Of course Ralph's family was faithfully cheering on the show, as were all of the honorary guests like Anna Wintour, Nina Garcia, Usher, Jude Law, Tom Hiddleston...and the list goes on. Then I think it's great that Ralph's shows feature men's, women's and children's looks all mixed up, and that the models are smiling every once in a while. There were a couple of very recognizable supermodels in the mix as well, like Naomi Campbell and Lucky Blue Smith. I'd say this show's atmosphere was light and joyful, and the outfits were refined and colorful!