Barbara Chandler has not been hit by the credit crunch but when the creative freelancer says she works three jobs, and has done for most of her life, you think you know why.
That’s until she reveals that just two of them, freelance writing and photography, actually earn her any money; as being a mum of two remains off the payroll.
“When I went to university in my 30s, I had three jobs – a mother, student and freelance writer. My children have left home now but I still have three roles.”
Just as she later replaced being a student of academia with being a student, albeit an informal one, of photography, her entry into writing independently was “accidental.”
Although she did a journalism course at the-then Regent St. Polytechnic, got a trainee post on a paper and ended up as an editor on Ideal Homes, going it alone wasn’t planned.
Speaking to FreelanceUK, the creative from Chiswick, West London, hinted it was also part of her ‘breaking the mould’ of what a woman with a place at a top university should do.
“To keep my parents happy, who were green about me leaving Oxford… I went onto the Slough Observer as a trainee reporter and then had my first baby aged 21.
“It was really then impossible to go back to being a reporter but I did get a job on a magazine for the furniture trade, and that’s how I fell into specialist writing.
“I then shook up my ideas, and although I had a second child by that time, went back to university because I wanted to do something more substantial.
“[But] I didn’t finish…, because I got really stuck for money and that’s when I started freelancing, almost accidentally.”
As soon as she was freelance, Ideal Homes offered her a retainer – still used by magazines keen to keep their niche contributors, serving to boost her confidence in her newly found craft.
Barbara wasn’t to know that more recognition of her talent, though this time a completely untapped one, would come at the foot of what she thought was an editorial obstacle.
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“With the retainer, I started the London Shopping Digest, but we didn’t have any decent photographs and we didn’t have a budget to send a photographer around after me.
“A friend of mine who was a professional photographer just said to me one day, almost absent-mindedly, “I don’t know why you don’t just take your own photographs, you’re perfectly capable.”
After the friend went with Barbara to a camera shop the next day, he instructed her to buy a manual Pentax K1000 camera, giving her every chance to learn the very basics.
“He said I should really learn what to do with apertures and speeds, which he warned would be tough, but he said I should take my photography as far as I can.”
“He helped process, cut, crop and adjust photos I took straight away and we got three shots that we actually used in the magazine, and again, my confidence was boosted.
“ I then just started to take photos, I had the camera and I was acquiring the skills.”
A print of an “edgy” photograph she recalls taking on that first roll, back in 1988, simply of a woman’s silhouette, was sold in London last week in an exhibition dedicated to Barbara.
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As part of the Regent Street Festival 2008, her ‘Love London’ exhibit drew the city’s political elite, the editors of leading design magazines, photographers, fans and, importantly, buyers.
To promote the show, Habitat emblazoned Barbara’s name on their front window and, seemingly pleased with the result, opened her showcase to their account customers.
Her other photographs, including snaps taken in Poland, Italy, Russia, Finland, France and the UK, are available as greeting cards sold by the Conran Shop or via her website.
Reflecting on her high-profile exposure, Barbara said that photography was her “main passion” though modestly she called it a hobby, because she does not accept commissions.
“The marvellous thing about teaching yourself is that you don’t have to bother with all the other stuff that the college would have made you learn.
“[For me], the biggest award [I can win] is just if someone buys a single card; the reason I did them is so that people could have a real photo that they could afford and in a compact form.”
As if further proof were needed that formal training doesn’t necessarily make a talented creative, Barbara currently writes for The Evening Standard and Grand Designs, among other publications.
“I only ever did that one-year course and then worked as a trainee reporter on the local paper – so I think I do perhaps pick things up pretty quickly…I’ve never had difficulty earning a living.”
Sep 24, 2008
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