Shropshire Star

Oswestry photographer in frame for national wedding award

A photographer from Oswestry has been short-listed for a national wedding awards for his images.

Published

A photographer from Oswestry has been short-listed for a national wedding awards for his images.

Phil Barrett, of PB Artworks, was nominated for the Wedding Industry Awards 2012 by a work associate from Oswestry company Crumblicious, which creates wedding cakes.

The 47 year-old, who has been married himself for 25 years, has covered about 30 weddings since setting up his business in 2010.

  • See more pictures in our gallery to your right

Now his unique style has captured the attention of the judges from the awards after many of his clients wrote them testimonies of praise for his work.

He is now in the finals for the category for the best newcomer in the wedding industry.

Mr Barrett revealed he did not realise he had been entered into the competition until an e-mail landed in his inbox telling him he had made the cut.

"I am quite excited," he said. "It is one of those things where there are quite a few people in the running.

"It is nice to have the recognition and it is quite an achievement."

There will be a special award ceremony in London on January 18 at the Cafe de Paris, in Coventry Street, where the winners are to be announced.

The awards are for those who have started out in the wedding industry within the last two years.

Mr Barrett, who is a father of two, first started his artistic career as an illustrator for Gibsons Greeting cards, in Telford.

But in March 2009 he was made redundant and decided to go to Glyndwr University to study photography.

He graduated with a first class honours degree in photography but discovered there were no jobs around for his field. So instead of waiting around he decided to set up his own business.

"Weddings are fantastic for me," he said. "I like working with wonderful people and witnessing their weddings. I very much enjoy working with people. My first ever serious wedding pictures were ones I took in May 2010 with Ben and Lauren Wild.

"I was nervous. But when it comes to weddings if you are not nervous then you don't care about what you are doing. It is nervous excitement.

"Before the day I planned it and thought about it and I got to know Ben and Lauren.

"I like to have dramatic dark skies and have an empathy with the weddings. It is the fine art approach."

Mr Barrett now has a studio in Leg Street, Oswestry, and his work is also displayed online. He said he found his Twitter account helped to get news out about his work and that many people retweeted his latest images.

For more information about Mr Barrett's work, visit www.pbartworks.co.uk or http://twitter.com/PbArtWorks

Sorry, we are not accepting comments on this article.