Santorini domes and flower pots

During a summer holiday by quad bike, David spots a photo opportunity, enhanced with quick thinking and a terracotta flowerpot...

It’s the summer of 2009, and I am on a stock photography holiday, sponsored by my new agency contracts and my relentless obsession to collect saleable imagery. Our accommodation is adequate, the sun is shining, and I have a dusty quad bike as my transport for the whole week. The hilarity starts when I video my wife Rachel as she drives it like a snail around a car park, grimacing the whole time. She doesn’t like anything that even slightly resembles a motorbike.

I have always had an affinity with the clean images of Santorini; layered houses with smooth white render, blue gates, hilltop windmills and a backdrop of infinite open ocean. It was the days before Santorini was seen as a somewhat travel cliché, but remember these places are cliché for a reason.