AirBnB

There’s a particular kind of magic that happens when someone’s home tells you everything about who they are before they’ve said a word. That was very much the case a weekend ago — well, two weekends ago now, apologies for the delay — when I found myself spending a few nights in an Airbnb up in Washington while attending the Kent Camera Trade Show.

It was my first time staying in an Airbnb, which I realize puts me firmly behind the curve, but I tend to be a creature of habit when it comes to travel. I’m glad this particular habit got broken. The place was extraordinary — not in a staged, interior-decorator way, but in the way that a space feels when someone has spent decades filling it with the things they genuinely love. Antique and vintage cameras, slide projectors, movie projectors, record players. Everywhere you looked, something was asking to be looked at more closely. It had that wonderful quality of density without clutter, where every corner holds something with a story behind it.

I spent most of the trip in trade show mode, which is its own kind of sensory overload, but on my last night there I finally slowed down enough to really take in the space. That’s when I grabbed my camera. There’s always something about that last night somewhere — a mild urgency, maybe, or just the fact that you’ve finally stopped rushing — that makes you more present. I moved through the rooms quietly, shooting the things that had been catching my eye all weekend. The projectors especially. There’s something about the mechanics of old image-making technology that I find genuinely moving, these objects that were built to throw light and story onto a wall, now sitting still and collecting a different kind of history.

I’ll be honest with you — I’m behind on getting these images up, and I’m sorry for that. Life has been a lot lately, and the photography side of things has taken a back seat in ways I’m still working to correct. But I didn’t want to let this one slip past without sharing it, because the experience genuinely stayed with me. So much so that I’m already thinking about when I can do it again, budget and schedule willing. If this is what Airbnb can be, I’m very much a convert.

Cheers, Aslynn