Vancouver Street Impressions, 2021

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What I love most when wandering Vancouver’s streets is looking at shop windows and the city reflected in their glass. Inside and outside overlap until it is hard to tell them apart—and impossible not to be fascinated…

As I was photographing this mannequin, a young woman with flowing long hair, who looked like the shopkeeper, was talking on the phone. “Oh my God,” she cried to the person on the other end, “someone’s taking pictures of my boyfriend…” Startled, I quickly asked, “May I take a photo?” “Go ahead,” she said. “You’ve already taken one anyway.” I thought to myself: making a shop prop your boyfriend—there really are all kinds of people in this world… Still, one look around her shop told me that she did have rather distinctive taste.

The pandemic had forced quite a few shops to close or change hands…

As I kept looking, I suddenly spotted three reflections of myself at once. It was wonderfully surreal, so I hurried to capture the scene—just as my phone began to ring…

Besides my fascination with reflections in shop windows, street art is another favorite of mine. The murals mingle with the life of the city—one still, the other in motion—to create a living picture. It is a fleeting piece of urban art, impossible to re-create…

And speaking of living pictures, people naturally become an essential part of them… How perfectly the color of this umbrella harmonizes with the cyclist’s clothes.

A bare-chested cyclist…

Going around shirtless seems to be one of Vancouver’s distinguishing features…

In Toronto, masks were mandatory inside shopping centers. In Vancouver they were recommended, but not required. Once, as I entered a secondhand bookshop, I asked the owner whether I needed to wear one. She said she would still be glad to see me put it on… So I did, of my own accord. There is quite a difference between choosing to do something and being compelled. This used-record shop used the cover of an old album to remind people to wear masks—a rather ingenious touch.

Vancouver has many small shops selling handicrafts, secondhand books, old records, and more… There are plenty of cafés and restaurants too. Buy a coffee in the afternoon and sit out on the street, and you can easily fall into conversation for a while with friends and strangers alike… This is a city that knows how to take life slowly.