Co Down photographer Rebecca Brownlie launches new book in Lisburn

Abandoned Ireland travels the length and breadth of the island of Ireland visiting and documenting our forgotten buildings, highlighting their social importance, and bringing their stories back to life through the medium of photography.

From Big Houses to humble cottages, schools to prisons, churches to dance halls, these buildings may now be abandoned, but they are far from empty. As a photographer, Brownlie’s instincts are remarkable. In the seemingly ruined and mundane she finds diamonds in the rough; her images of the ordinary ephemera of past lives – dusty love letters, rusting spectacles, photographs yellowed and curled with age – paint the pictures of real people and full lives.

Rebecca Brownlie’s photography reverberates with the echoes of our ancestors. Bursting with engaging and often surprising details, each haunting photograph is an invitation to immerse yourself in history, and an Ireland long gone.

Rebecca Brownlie grew up in a small rural village in Co. Down.

When she was just twelve years old, she won her first camera on a TV game show and her love of photography was sparked.

From that day on, a camera is rarely far from her side. Her passion for abandoned buildings and love of photography have led her to appear on several local television shows featuring some of Ireland’s lost buildings. She is an avid adventurer, and can be regularly found hiking up mountainsides with her four legged friend and children in tow.