The elephants arrive - and sanity returns to TPOTY

Image courtesy Nick Meers

Anyone calling or emailing the TPOTY office in the past few weeks may well have noticed that we’ve all seemed a little distracted. Combining the production of a new book and a new range of cards, postcards and prints with the launch of a major exhibition has left us feeling a little jaded, but it all came together last night in a rather wonderful way, with the launch party for the Travel Photographer of the Year exhibition at the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG).

A three-day build time meant that when our guests arrived we were actually ready for them – unlike last year, when prints were still being slipped into place as a queue formed outside. But those three days were definitely needed, as the exhibition is much bigger than last year, with displays stretching right down to the lawn of the Society.

Young helpers prepare the shop for the launch. Image: Nick Meers

Fulfilling a childhood ambition of mine, we also have a shop! Here exhibition visitors can pick up postcards, greetings cards and prints of some of the exhibited images and of some key images from previous years of the awards. It is true, but a little sad to say, that as magnificent image after magnificent image was put into place on the exhibition stands, I still gained a particular thrill from the fact that we also took delivery of a quantity of small paper bags to contain some of the goodies!

Journey Four, sadly, didn’t arrive in time, as it was making its way down from Scotland in a delivery van (we did say that it would be hot off the presses!), but it has arrived today in the shop and is looking glorious.

Image: Nick Meers

A number of the featured photographers came along, including Arne Hansen, Emik Mikkelsen, Marcin Mikolajczuk and Malgorzata Pioro, who travelled from Germany, Denmark and Poland respectively. And huge number of supporters of the awards, including sponsors, previous award winners, judges and other friends of TPOTY came along to open the exhibition in style. The launch evening went with a swing, helped along by the ever-popular Cutty Sark cocktails, specially created on a photographic theme, and for which the recipes appear below. And the sun shone!

Elephants on patrol! Image courtesy Nick Meers

But what about those elephants? The Elephant Family charity is housing two of its wonderful models with us, and they have found a happy temporary home on the grass at the RGS, from where they have a terrific view of a number of the images on display. And these lovely animals are for sale – individually or as a pair (it would be a shame to split up mother and child!). Contact Jessie at Elephant Family on 0207 251 5099 if you would like to know more. And you can learn about the work of the charity here: http://www.elephantfamily.org/

A lot of people have worked enormously hard to make this exhibition possible, and we are tremendously grateful to every one of them. And, if you have need to call or email the TPOTY office from now on, there’s a good chance that the person you contact might actually be able to respond with some clarity!

The TPOTY exhibition is open from June 22nd to August 19th. Opening hours: 9.30am-5pm Monday- Saturday and 10am-4pm Sunday.