Food and Restaurants
Green Lipped Mussells, Mundo, Alderley Edge
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Since
2001 I have been providing all the photographs for the Food and Drink column in
the Manchester Evening News Go section, now renamed City Life; that's somewhere in the region of 45
restaurants to be photographed each year.
The column is written by a team of three writers, Neil Sowerby, Paul Ogden and Yakub Qureshi. You can view their latest work on the Manchester Evening News site.
Jonathan
Schofield, a former Manchester Evening News writer, now with Manchester
Confidential, said of my work, “Phil Taylor's photographs of the food and drink
establishments I review captures the essence of a venue and distills it down
into a colourful aperitif for my words. Or in plain English he produces
excellent work displaying the interiors and exteriors of places, plus the dishes
available. His knowledge of food no doubt helps with the quality of the imagery.
Sometimes when I'm being rude about the food though his photographs are too
good. As a reviewer it would be pleasant if the camera lied
occasionally.”
I’ve
always had a totally free hand with
the work I submit. I have changed the style of photography from the rather
stilted pictures of waiters chatting to customers to close ups of food that
would be of a quality suitable to use in a glossy recipe book, to interiors that would
be at home in a lifestyle magazine. The challenge of a weekly column is finding
a new and innovative way to keep the reader’s interest.
The
column never used to go behind the scenes in the kitchen, but the rise of the
celebrity chef requires that the kitchen action should be recorded too. Since I
started I’ve only ever been refused access to 4 kitchens.
I have
contributed to the Time Out Guide to Eating and
Drinking in
In
addition, my work is widely used in the City Life Food and Drink Guides that are
published each October.
In
September 2006 I was approached by
I offer a
digital photography service to restaurants, with pictures provided on CD ROM or
DVD with open licensing, for them to use as they wish. The images are suitable
for use in menus, web sites and advertising or magazines.
The Dining Room, Rawtenstall, Luso,Manchester, Pacifica, Eccles and The Fat Loaf, Altrincham have used my work in this way.