Where I'm Going This Summer 🛶☀️

When I started this project two years ago, I didn’t think it had this much room to grow. But something keeps calling me back.

Last summer I focused on New England. This summer the journey is wider geographically and in scope.

I want to capture more portraits this year. Girls come back from summer camp different. There’s a confidence to them, a lightness and sometimes a joy that wasn’t there before. You can see it in a face, and I want more of that. I’m also making space for still life work: trunks, letters home, friendship bracelets, camp awards. The objects of the camp world - J.Crew proved the point when they built their entire summer campaign around a fictional version of one.
The timing is suspicious. ;)

So I’m heading out again. Six camps, six states and for the first time, one of them is a boys camp.

Here’s where I’m going, and why.

Camp Cheley — Colorado

Cheley is a quintessential western camp, and that’s been a gap in this project. I’m looking to capture the dusty dirt roads, the horses, the mountain views. My favourite detail: the oldest girls sleep in wagons. I can’t wait.

Camp Riva Lake — Tennessee

Riva Lake has been running since 1922, and you feel that kind of history in a place. Last summer I photographed a camp in Virginia and fell in love with the terrain, the thick, lush greens and that warm southern light. I’m hoping to find more of that here.

Camp Merrie-Woode — North Carolina

Merrie-Woode wasn’t on my original list. But after connecting with a fellow camp alumna through Substack, she convinced me to add it. I’m very glad she did. Thank you, Lulu.

Camp Ogichi Daa Kwe — Minnesota

Ogichi sits about as far north as you can get in Minnesota before you hit Canada, by water. The camp is centred around canoe trips, and while I won’t be able to join one (they run eight days or more), I want to capture the departure: the loading up, the send-off, everything that comes before their journey.

Clearwater Camp — Wisconsin

Clearwater was the camp that first fired my imagination when I started sketching out this itinerary. The property is split across two sites - the lodge and all the activities on the main grounds, and then the campers’ cabins on a detached island. Every day, the girls walk across a bridge connecting the two. I don’t know exactly why, but that image has stayed with me since I first read about it. There’s something cinematic about it.

Camp Pasquaney — New Hampshire

If Wes Anderson made a summer camp, it would look something like Pasquaney. The aesthetic is extraordinary, and the history runs deep. What sealed it for me: Pasquaney is the brother camp to a girls camp I photographed last summer, and after going down a rabbit hole of old videos online, I was completely sold. This one is new territory for the project in more ways than one.

Just like last summer I will keep a weekly blog writing about these camps and sharing images. Stay tuned!