The Ukrainian photographer Dmitri Stepanenko has been living in London for many years now. However, he advocates the need to escape from the bustling city and reconnect with the sea, just like in his hometown of Odesa.

“I started working on the project in 2018 when I became a little tired of London and began going to small seaside towns around it in search of inspiration.

I grew up by the sea however never cherished it when I could see it every day, like it is often the case with people taking things for granted.

Only after I moved to London did I realise that something important was missing in my life and that I could only get proper rest by the seaside.

A lot of work has been done before focusing on British seaside towns in the second half of the 20th century.

Many things have changed however since that time primarily due to cheap plane tickers becoming available and people travelling to warmer countries.

The towns that were once bustling with life became shadows of themselves.

This however changed again unexpectedly and dramatically during the Covid pandemic when travel restrictions were introduced leading to a boom in internal tourism.

The seaside towns in close proximity to London (hence the name of the project) again became very popular destinations for weekend trips.

Sometimes it felt that there was much more life there compared to central London itself. Still, for me such places remained a kind of a sanctuary where I could recharge my batteries while observing the interactions between people and nature.”