Photo London – the UK’s biggest photography fair – is back again. Running from 08–12 September 2021, Photo London celebrates the world’s leading galleries, bringing together both the world’s most iconic photographers and emerging talent, all within Somerset House. The fair prints and displays photographic work for the public to enjoy and take in, from Rankin’s 1995 photograph of Jude Law and Ronald McDonald to a Robert Capa exhibition.

Although Brits are taking and storing more photos than ever – with an average of 7,500 images stored within our camera phones and iCloud albums – very few of our own photos are physically printed. Now, with international photo curators PastBook (www.pastbook.com) revealing that 52% of the nation have no physical record of photos of their images, the majority of our own best photos are left languishing on our devices or in cloud storage. Further to this, data by PastBook also reveals:

29% of Brits say all their life events over the last 5-10 years have been captured for their social media accounts and they have no physical record of them

35% of Brits would have no record of their favourite photos and memories if it wasn’t for their social media accounts or phone

Over half (52%) of people in the UK don’t own any physical copies of their favourite photos

More than one third (32%) of people in the UK fear losing their most cherished memories when they get a new phone as they have not organised them
As we celebrate the renowned Photo London, PastBook now encourages the nation to celebrate, print and preserve their own photographs. PastBook captures these images and turns them into an image-based memoir – preserved forever. The platform’s sophisticated technology automatically creates a unique photo book of our most precious memories in just one click. Collecting the highlights of your Instagram, Facebook, Dropbox, Flickr, Picasa, computer, phone or tablet, PastBook selects the users’ best photos and instantly arranges them into a high-quality photo book.

Daniel Scheijen, CMO of PastBook, discusses:

“As all lockdown restrictions have now lifted, it is great to see Brits once again enjoying and celebrating the medium of photography. Photo London, in particular, is a renowned event that not only presents iconic photographs, but works from emerging talent too.

With this in mind, it is interesting to note that 52% of the nation still have no physical record of their own photographic work. Preserving our images in a hard copy creates a tangible way to relive our memories and celebrate the images we have taken ourselves.

Particularly during the lockdown period, with many of us using our phones as our primary camera, we now all have a digital photo album of our most important life memories, one which we can look back on in years to come. At PastBook, we create well-curated, stylistic logs of these social accounts and turn them into image-based memoirs – preserved forever.”