Introducing Unsplash Local
Hello there!
I’m Alice, the newest member of the Unsplash Community team. My journey to becoming an official Unsplash team member has been a long one.
My relationship with Unsplash first started when I used some of the photos in my design work. Shortly after, I became an Unsplash contributor, submitting my very own images to Unsplash. Then, I saw that Unsplash was hosting meetups in New York and I thought, “Hey, why not Boston?”. So, I shot the team an email asking when they were coming up North and serendipitously, moments later, received a message back from our founder Mikael, saying that he was in a coffee shop with his wife and co-founder Steph in downtown Boston. We met up that day, and one over-caffeinated, whirlwind-conversation later, I was hosting Unsplash meetups and photowalks in Beantown.
As I grew the community here in Boston, Unsplash photographers began hosting meetups in cities across the globe — Barcelona, London, Seoul, Montreal, San Francisco and New York, to name a few. My dedication to Unsplash grew as I saw how it could bring creative people together, in a way that was different than other organizations I was involved in.
When the Unsplash team mentioned that they were interested in tackling the ambitious goal of launching Unsplash communities in 100-cities across the globe in 2017, I thought about how exciting this adventure would be, and that I was eager to be the one to lead it.
Unsplash communities in 100-cities across the globe…
Starting Fresh
Unsplash Meetups already exist, photowalks have occurred in cities across the world and we already have a few Ambassadors on board—so why are we ‘announcing’ something new?
Think of this as a rocket-pack strapped to a grassroots movement. We are committing to a new level of support and community-growth that is deserving of an entirely new framework.
With that in mind, we are psyched to share the new and improved vision for Unsplash meetups and events.
Drumroll please…
Introducing, Unsplash Local
The offline community bringing you the beautiful inspiration you find daily on unsplash.com.
We have big plans for Local. We are working towards a future where we can offer workshops, retreats and photography experiences that redefine the field but, as Russel Simmons tells us, “It’s important to focus on what we do best and master one craft at a time”, so with that advice in mind, we are going to focus on forming strong communities across the world, by mastering what has already proven to be our most successful Unsplash event, the photowalk.
When we were brainstorming how to strengthen, grow and gather our creative network we realized that people love Unsplash because the photos that are available to them are like no other. They are sometimes so impossibly beautiful and inspirational that its difficult to imagine how they were taken. What if we could demystify that beauty by creating the experiences that give birth to those photos in the first place? What if we could do it through a new kind of photo-adventure led by the best photographers on Unsplash?
Introducing Unsplash Expeditions
An Unsplash Expedition is an über adventure-minded, purpose-driven, photowalk led by an Unsplash photographer. ‘Expedition’ is a borrowed term meaning ‘an excursion, journey, or voyage made for some specific purpose’. The idea is that a local photographer will lead you on an Expedition that will bring you to different and unique locations, creating moments that might inspire you to take photos that feel like the images you see (and love) on Unsplash.
#UnsplashExpedition
Unsplash Local Community Update
In the past few weeks we have been lucky enough to partner with some of our favorite Unsplash photographers—Samuel Zeller, Clem Onojeghuo, Jeremy Bishop and Patrick Tomasso—to act as Guides across the globe. We are so thankful for this incredibly dedicated community that has grown with us over the past few years and can’t wait to see what’s to come in 2017.
Stay tuned here for more Local news and announcements as communities launch across the world.
In the meantime, get involved with Unsplash and Local happenings by joining our Unsplash Community Slack channel.
Wishing you an adventurous, creative and most of all happy, New Year!
Want to say hello? Shoot an email to alice@unsplash.com or join me on Slack.
