What’s On
From artist exhibitions and talks to creative workshops, screenings and book launches we host an array of events that bring photographic art creators and fans together to learn and connect.
Attending Our Events
All of our events are free unless stated otherwise, we have optional RSVP for each event, but we welcome walk- ins. Paid or private events can be booked below or via the organiser.
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
The Photobook Cafe Zine Reading Room
ZINE POP‑UP READING ROOM
Welcome to our Zine Pop‑Up Reading Room.
What’s Happening:
On the days of our zine workshops, we transform our basement gallery into a vibrant zine reading room. Seeing a selection of curated titles from our onsite collection. Admission is free and open to all. Come by to browse, flip through, and get inspired by a curated selection of independent zines.
Zine Workshops (6 PM – 8 PM):
After exploring the reading room, join our hands-on zine-making workshop. Whether you're new to zines or a seasoned maker, booking is required to secure your spot.
Zine Club
Turn your London snaps into a handmade zine!
Join us for our next Zine Workshop led by a pro photographer + bookmaker @felixfalckn
What to expect:
-Choose your favourite photos
-Print and design your own paper keepsake
-Trim, fold, and staple your zine by hand
-Enjoy a drink while you create in a cozy creative space
_
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
1 Zine included with your ticket
Book Launch: Gone & Leaving by Agostina Cerullo
Gone & Leaving began as something much larger, a 13-meter-long accordion object that unfolded across tables and floors, somewhere between a book, an installation, and an emotional map. It was built during a time of rupture, frantically collecting fragments of images, thoughts, and emotional residue, searching for form through chaos in a raw and instinctive way.
Over time, the project shifted and condensed, what once occupied the length of a room is now held between two hands.
A year and a half later, it has become what it is today: a small, intimate book. Still accordion-made, still layered and unstable, like memory itself.
The book moves like a film strip: frame by frame, it carries photographs, scans, journal pages, and marks of absence. Its black surfaces absorb and reflect, evoking the cinematic, the intimate, the remembered.
At its core, Gone & Leaving is a book about departures, from places, people, and pieces of identity. It asks: What remains? What unfolds when everything familiar dissolves?
Each of the 100 signed copies is hand-bound, with unique variations and handmade additions. No two are exactly the same.
A book to sit with, to return to, to quietly feel your way through.
To celebrate the launch, there will also be a solo exhibition curated by Anna Leyko, where I’ll be showing a 35mm film slide projection titled In Between Loss and Whatever Comes After. It brings together unseen parts of the project I’ve been working on since late 2023.
_______________________________________________
Agostina Cerullo is an Argentinian visual artist and photographer whose work often grows out of movement and change. Having lived between places, she has developed a sensitivity to leaving, adapting, and holding onto memory.
Her practice shifts between photography, installation, moving image, and experimental bookmaking, often touching on themes of grief, identity, and transformation. She works in a hands-on way, using layered images, handmade forms, and personal fragments to explore how feelings can take shape.
She began as a self-taught photographer before continuing her studies at the University of the Arts London and the School of Visual Arts in New York.
Her projects often sit somewhere between archive and sculpture, mixing personal traces with open-ended storytelling. At the core is a search for connection, for ways of making sense of movement and change through shared experience.
The Photobook Cafe Zine Reading Room
ZINE POP‑UP READING ROOM
Welcome to our Zine Pop‑Up Reading Room.
What’s Happening:
On the days of our zine workshops, we transform our basement gallery into a vibrant zine reading room. Seeing a selection of curated titles from our onsite collection. Admission is free and open to all. Come by to browse, flip through, and get inspired by a curated selection of independent zines.
Zine Workshops (6 PM – 8 PM):
After exploring the reading room, join our hands-on zine-making workshop. Whether you're new to zines or a seasoned maker, booking is required to secure your spot.
Zine Club
Turn your London snaps into a handmade zine!
Join us for our next Zine Workshop led by a pro photographer + bookmaker @felixfalckn
What to expect:
-Choose your favourite photos
-Print and design your own paper keepsake
-Trim, fold, and staple your zine by hand
-Enjoy a drink while you create in a cozy creative space
_
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
1 Zine included with your ticket
A Take on the World.1970s. Photography Bob Bentley. A Documentary Photobook Launch & Exhibitio
BOOK LAUNCH: 6pm-10.30pm Thurs 25 Sept
EXHIBITION OPEN FROM: 4pm Wed 24 Sept - 5pm Sun 28 Sept
A Take on the World.1970s. Photography Bob Bentley. A Documentary Photobook & Exhibition. Step into the world of the 1970s through the lens of Bob Bentley. A Take on the World, a 270 page full colour hard-back Photobook of recently rediscovered pictures taken around the world in the 1970s. Launching at the Photobook Café on 25 September 2025 alongside an exhibition showcasing a selection of the photographs published in the book. Short videos, one for each location will be screened in the cafe and gallery. And there will be an opportunity to buy both the book and select prints during and after. Bob Bentley is an artist, photographer and BAFTA-winning Film & TV director. In the 1970s he travelled the world, creating a colourful, and candid photographic record of people and places. Long unseen, these images now form “A Take on the World - 1970s”, his new photobook of rediscovered documentary pictures.
A Take on the World.1970s. Photography Bob Bentley. A Documentary Photobook Launch & Exhibition
BOOK LAUNCH: 6pm-10.30pm Thurs 25 Sept
EXHIBITION OPEN FROM: 4pm Wed 24 Sept - 5pm Sun 28 Sept
A Take on the World.1970s. Photography Bob Bentley. A Documentary Photobook & Exhibition. Step into the world of the 1970s through the lens of Bob Bentley. A Take on the World, a 270 page full colour hard-back Photobook of recently rediscovered pictures taken around the world in the 1970s. Launching at the Photobook Café on 25 September 2025 alongside an exhibition showcasing a selection of the photographs published in the book. Short videos, one for each location will be screened in the cafe and gallery. And there will be an opportunity to buy both the book and select prints during and after. Bob Bentley is an artist, photographer and BAFTA-winning Film & TV director. In the 1970s he travelled the world, creating a colourful, and candid photographic record of people and places. Long unseen, these images now form “A Take on the World - 1970s”, his new photobook of rediscovered documentary pictures.
The Photobook Cafe Zine Reading Room
ZINE POP‑UP READING ROOM
Welcome to our Zine Pop‑Up Reading Room.
What’s Happening:
On the days of our zine workshops, we transform our basement gallery into a vibrant zine reading room. Seeing a selection of curated titles from our onsite collection. Admission is free and open to all. Come by to browse, flip through, and get inspired by a curated selection of independent zines.
Zine Workshops (6 PM – 8 PM):
After exploring the reading room, join our hands-on zine-making workshop. Whether you're new to zines or a seasoned maker, booking is required to secure your spot.
The Photobook Cafe Zine Reading Room
ZINE POP‑UP READING ROOM
Welcome to our Zine Pop‑Up Reading Room.
What’s Happening:
On the days of our zine workshops, we transform our basement gallery into a vibrant zine reading room. Seeing a selection of curated titles from our onsite collection. Admission is free and open to all. Come by to browse, flip through, and get inspired by a curated selection of independent zines.
Zine Workshops (6 PM – 8 PM):
After exploring the reading room, join our hands-on zine-making workshop. Whether you're new to zines or a seasoned maker, booking is required to secure your spot.
Zine Club
Turn your London snaps into a handmade zine!
Join us for our next Zine Workshop led by a pro photographer + bookmaker @felixfalckn
What to expect:
-Choose your favourite photos
-Print and design your own paper keepsake
-Trim, fold, and staple your zine by hand
-Enjoy a drink while you create in a cozy creative space
_
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
1 Zine included with your ticket
Art Exhibition: 'Homegrown' by Smalls Gallery
Smalls Gallery is about a genuine love for art and bringing people together. I have been to many art shows, music showcases and felt very inspired. Due to the ways it has made people feel about the art even if it wasn’t my personal taste. I cannot deny its impact. We don’t represent artists specifically rather having a focus on building community and putting on shows. The art world is very inaccessible if you do not have ties to it from your parents or if you are working class person interested in art or a working class artist.
I wanted to create a gallery to combat that. Go back to the essence of what made me love art…which is the art itself. The curated shows that allowed me to wonder!
This was created out of my need to be apart but in true Leo fashion I want do what I want! So I wanted to create a mould that was about the work & people who create and enjoy the work! This model is antagonistic to what I’ve always seen the art industry represent. It’s about stripping everything back.
‘Homegrown’ is an exploration of place and personhood, how they influence each other within visual artistry. It’s about challenging the idea that one must belong to one home. Acknowledging the different things that influence our personhood , that these things are not barriers but openers to a different understanding of self - and then art. This exhibition includes; Kendrafilmz, Toni Micheal, Manu Nzinga, Adeze Akabogu and Medua Uwechue.
Social media handles
@smallsgallery_ and @elishasmalls_
Book Launch: The Congress of the Disappeared by Bernardo Kucinski
Join us for the launch of Bernardo Kucinski's novella 'The Congress of the Disappeared', translated by Tom Gatehouse and published by Latin America Bureau & Practical Action Publishing.
In Kucinski’s novella, the ghosts of those disappeared by Brazil’s military dictatorship come together with iconic figures from Brazilian history and more recent victims of state and para-state violence to organize a congress.
In this imagined space, Kucinski draws a line from the state violence of Brazil’s military dictatorship (and since) to the genocide and slavery of the colonial period in Latin America. He gives a voice to the victims, especially the disappeared, allowing them to challenge the attempt to erase them from history and denounce a culture of impunity which continues to pollute Brazilian politics today.
Event hosted by LAB, Brazil Matters, and Amnesty International UK Latin America coordinators.
Speakers:
Bernardo Kucinski (author)
Tom Gatehouse (translator)
Sheila Royce (Amnesty International UK Latin America coordinator)
Ali Rocha (Brazil Matters)
Bernardo Kucinski (b. 1937, São Paulo) is a Brazilian journalist, writer, and political scientist. He has received Brazil’s Jabuti Award on two occasions and was awarded the Brazilian National Library Literary Price in 2014. Kucinski has been a professor at the University of São Paulo, a collaborator with Brazil’s Workers’ Party, and served as advisor to the President of the Republic during the first term of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The Congress of The Disappeared, The Past is an Imperfect Tense (both translated by Tom Gatehouse), and K (translated by Sue Branford) are all published by the Latin American Bureau in partnership with Practical Action Publishing.
Brythonic Photography Exhibition by Dylan Garcia
Brythonic is a project dealing with, time, deeptime, climate change and Britain real or mythological.
Dylan Garcia's practice deals with issues of time, history, mythology, human consciousness and how this relates to the natural world.
Dylan Garcia is a lens based artist living in southern England. He is a member of RPS (Royal Photographic Society), and OVADA (Oxfordshire Visual Arts Development Agency).
He was awarded the Daylight/Format24 Award.
He has exhibited in Rome, London, Athens, Oxford, Cambridge, Amongst other places, and at the Chester Photographic Festival (UK).
Dylans Photobook Brythonic is in the collections of the National Art Library V&A (London UK), Photo Book Cafe (London UK), Hasselblad Foundation (Gothenburg Sweden), PHMuseum (Bologna Italy) and the Photo Book Museum (Cologne Germany).
Dylan has a BA in Graphics (Photography) from Norwich School of Art, MA Photography from Falmouth University and holds ARPS from the Royal Photographic Society.
Social media handles
@dylangarcialensart
Zine Club
Turn your London snaps into a handmade zine!
Join us for our next Zine Workshop led by a pro photographer + bookmaker @felixfalckn
What to expect:
-Choose your favourite photos
-Print and design your own paper keepsake
-Trim, fold, and staple your zine by hand
-Enjoy a drink while you create in a cozy creative space
_
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
1 Zine included with your ticket
PBC Reading Room: Photobook Collection Contributions
Discover Fresh Photobook Narratives
Step into the cozy retreat of the Photobook Café’s Reading Room, where each visit brings fresh discovery. We're delighted to present the latest submissions to our ever-growing photobook collection, featuring personal photo narratives, insightful zines, rare self-published volumes, and curator-selected works that redefine visual storytelling.
Why Visit Us?
New Releases on Display - Whether you're browsing creative storytelling, documentary photography, or experimental layouts, you’ll always find something distinctive and compelling.
Browse & Immerse – The reading room is freely accessible during café hours. No booking required, just drop in and leaf through our growing collection at your leisure photobookcafe+1photobookcafe-archive.co.uk.
Curated for Creativity – We thoughtfully categorize each new submission using Omeka, ensuring easy browsing and discovery of emerging photographers and artists.
Inclusive Community Spotlight – From personal passion projects to boundary-pushing self-publishing experiments, our photobook collection champions voices often overlooked by mainstream platforms.
Want more? Our Monthly Photobook Displays
Photobook Displays – Every month, we spotlight new entries with curated showcases in our cafe.
What's In The Collection – Delve deeper into the stories behind the pages, featuring what’s in the collection reels by our team.
It’s not too late to be a part of it yourself, head to our photobook collection page to find out how to submit your photobook now!
The Photobook Cafe Zine Reading Room
ZINE POP‑UP READING ROOM
Welcome to our Zine Pop‑Up Reading Room.
What’s Happening:
On the days of our zine workshops, we transform our basement gallery into a vibrant zine reading room. Seeing a selection of curated titles from our onsite collection. Admission is free and open to all. Come by to browse, flip through, and get inspired by a curated selection of independent zines.
Zine Workshops (6 PM – 8 PM):
After exploring the reading room, join our hands-on zine-making workshop. Whether you're new to zines or a seasoned maker, booking is required to secure your spot.
Zine Club
Turn your London snaps into a handmade zine!
Join us for our next Zine Workshop led by a pro photographer + bookmaker @felixfalckn
What to expect:
-Choose your favourite photos
-Print and design your own paper keepsake
-Trim, fold, and staple your zine by hand
-Enjoy a drink while you create in a cozy creative space
_
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
1 Zine included with your ticket
Heads of a Family
Heads of a Family is a collaborative project that reimagines the family archive through their Ivorian and Indian diasporic lenses. Drawing from inherited photographs, the work explores memory, migration, identity, and lineage while questioning who is remembered and how stories are preserved.
Through collage, layering, manipulation, and restaging, the artists reclaim narratives long shaped by colonial legacies and displacement. The notion of the “head of the family” is redefined, shifting focus from patriarchal authority to maternal, symbolic, and often invisible leadership. The result is a reimagined family album of resistance, continuity, and connection.
Social media handles
https://www.instagram.com/chanslensesx/?locale=fr_CA. https://www.instagram.com/yvann_zahui/
NEW EXHIBITION SET TO OPEN IN LONDON THIS FALL BY ARTIST, MICHAEL PATTERSON.
A brand new, temporary photography exhibition “SNAP, CLICK, POP!”, is set to open in the heart of London’s Shoreditch neighborhood this Fall, at the Photobook Cafe, with images by New York based artist, Michael Patterson.
Photobook Cafe is a cultural hub, building a vibrant community where conversation, connection, and creativity thrive alongside diversity and acceptance. As part of their recently expanded bar and Gallery Space the Cafe has teamed up with photographer, Michael Patterson, “MP” to friends, to create a new exhibition, “SNAP, CLICK, POP!”.
Visitors will be able to see a variety of Patterson’s photography, including Four 16 x 16 Giclee Prints that showcase the spectrum of the artist’s work – City Scapes, Images from his “Bathtub Series”, Images from his self-published book “Stolen Moments,” and a collection of Fashion Images. All images are shot on Apple iPhone.
Michael Patterson is a Photographer, Stylist, and Artist based in New York City. As a muse to the late, Jean Michel Basquiat, Patterson is the only living man in art history to have been painted multiple times by the artist. A true legend in the New York fashion, culture, and nightlife scenes Patterson’s photography work explores his intimate connection with his city and the unique fleeting moments of strangers in the wild. Patterson has had previous Gallery Shows at the Cheryl Hazan Gallery, The Fire Island Hotel Gallery Show, Village Works Solo Show, and Good Head Salon, among others.
He said of the new exhibition: “Using my phone allows me to catch moments immediately – I’m always looking for the possibilities”.
Mini-Zine Pop-Up Club
Mini-Zine Pop-Up Club with Felix
We’re excited to host our first Mini-Zine Pop-Up Workshop with Felix, a relaxed, hands-on evening designed for anyone curious about zine-making and looking for a more social, creative environment to connect with others.
This is a drop-in session — no booking required. You can arrive any time between 6 PM and 8 PM and stay as long as you like until we wrap up at 8 PM.
Using ShrimpZine, a fun and intuitive zine template app, we’ll guide you through making your own black-and-white, staple-bound zines from scratch. The process is simple, experimental, and perfect for beginners — but equally inspiring if you’re already a zinester looking to swap ideas and meet others in the community.
All essential materials will be provided, but feel free to bring your own A4 paper if you’d like to use something special.
💸 This is a pay-what-you-can event:
Pay what you can at the bar to take part
For each additional zine you print, we’ll also ask you to pay what you can to cover printing costs
Alongside the workshop, our basement gallery will showcase a curated selection of zines to inspire your own creations and spark conversation.
Whether you’ve been curious about zines for years or just want to try something new in a friendly, creative space, this workshop is the perfect chance to make, share, and connect.
The way we stand by Azeez Kazzim
A series of portraits made outdoors, exploring how we present ourselves through the way we stand, move, and dress. This work reflects on the small but telling choices we make, how posture and clothing can quietly express who we are. Set against open, natural spaces, the images capture a sense of presence, softness, and connection between people and their surroundings.
Social media handles
@azeezkazzim
Book Launch - Post Postgraduate: The Real Work Experience Diary by Cleonie McLean
Cleonie is a London-born author, Senior Programme Manager, and former retail leader whose career has spanned some of the UK’s most recognisable high street brands. With a Jamaican heritage and a sharp, witty voice, she brings a fresh, authentic perspective to the realities of ambition, identity, and survival in modern working life.
Her debut memoir, Post Postgraduate: The Real Work Experience Diary, is an unfiltered, often hilarious, and deeply relatable journey through her 13-year career in UK retail management, from sales floor shifts to senior roles. Woven with cultural insight, personal resilience, and sharp workplace observations, the book speaks to anyone who’s ever navigated work politics, code-switching, or the gap between academic dreams and real-world work.
Cleonie’s work champions ambition without sugarcoating the grind, and her storytelling blends warmth, humour, and hard-earned wisdom. Post Postgraduate is her first book, and this London launch marks the official celebration of its release.
Social Media Handles
Instagram @cleonie__ , TikTok @cleonieofficial
Film Screening and Photobook: 'Mai Ni Meriye' a project by Aashna Singh
Mai Ni Meriye is a pocket-sized photobook, and a short documentary film containing content from interviews with 19 local women in Dharamshala, Himachal Pradesh– a hill station town among the Himalayas in Northern India. The goal of the project is to draw attention to the aspects of labor within a traditional family structure, and to understand reproductive labor from the perspectives of women at the grassroots level and for the labor of “love” to be part of a wide range of conversations from small village discussions over tea, to mainstream platforms with influential voices- all in service of a new perspective on women and housework. Concept and Production by Aashna Singh. Book Design and Photography by Farheen Fatima. Film by Abhinav Sharma.
Social Media Handles
@aashnaaashna @farheenay @_abhi.7s @mai_ni_meriye
Exhibition: CLEAR WATER STUNS THE ONLOOKER
A group exhibition showcasing the works of Jess Wishart, Billie Stringer, Hannah Hall, Samuel Edwards and Nikolai Voelcker.
Jess Wishart
Wishart is a photographer making work about how we live, how we connect with each other, and ourselves. How do we navigate digital spaces, what does autonomy mean when we have the ability to be any version of ourselves, or someone else entirely? So much of the visual content we associate with technology is imbued with sci-fi aesthetics, glossy, sleek, and clean. But this same technology is so ingrained in our daily lives, in many senses it is our daily lives. Wishart aims to create work that is closer to that reality. Centred around a traditional photographic practise, and then various modes of digital manipulation are used to sculpt out new ways of looking at the initial image. Breaking the barrier between the two worlds.
Hannah Hall
Hall’s work is rooted in an exploration of morality and women’s emotions beyond the confines of stereotypes, giving space for her subjects to be nuanced and contradictory. Her practice combines costume, set design and performance. Whilst also drawing inspiration from her own lived experiences, she builds intimate visual narratives that challenge traditional portrayals of identity and emotion. Her process is deeply collaborative, with each subject contributing to the development of a distinct character within an intentionally constructed scene. At the heart of Hall’s practice is a sense of nihilism, an exploration of themes she feels are only spoken in hushed tones when affecting women. Hall is motivated to create a space where women are allowed to be controversial and complex.
Samuel Edwards
Exploring themes of desire, voyeurism and vulnerability, Edward’s work is motivated by his own nuanced reflections of relationships. Creating imagery with the intention of constructing raw, tender and complex moments with his subjects, allowing onlookers to form their own personal interpretations. “I prefer when it seems like I’m not even there”. Having been advised early in his photographic career to be careful about labelling his work as queer Edward’s felt like he distanced himself from exploring his own queer identity for several years. “Now, it feels liberating to start again, creating work that reflects sexuality on my own terms.”
Nikolai Voelcker
Nikolai Voelcker is a Zurich-born photographer and director based in London. Operating at the intersection of cinematic image-making and staged portraiture, Nikolai's photographs and films construct emotionally charged, highly composed, and sometimes humorous worlds that explore youth and male dynamics. He tells stories often inspired from his own life experiences, by challenging everyday situations among men. Deeply committed to creating work about and within his surroundings, his sets, styling, and other personal details act as markers of his unique style. His work invites viewers into moments of vulnerability and transformation, they’re intimate and marked by softness and distinct visual clarity.
Billie Stringer
Billie Stringer is an Irish photographer based between London and Paris, whose work explores her way of seeing as a queer woman, curating a world that exists at the intersection between portraiture and performance. She is driven by collaboration within the image making process, with each image being born from conversation and each person who sits in front of her camera having as much autonomy in the outcome of the image as she does.
Original Magazine | Launch Party
Original Magazine is a contemporary and multidisciplinary publication. One of our aims is to provide a dedicated platform in which to grow the visibility of diverse creatives in the industry, and encourage them to amplify their voice through the art they create, as creativity is the perfect outlet to showcase individuality. O.M Vol.2 aims to championing female and gender non-confirming artists. This print will focus on how multifaceted these artists are whilst also bringing attention to the impossible standards placed on any minority within the industry. O.M Vol.2 shares first person accounts from a diverse range of creatives, commentary on their experiences in the spotlight in 2025, and also celebrate their projects and successes. Alongside writing pieces aiming to inform the reader about our talent's upcoming projects, O.M Vol.2 will pull back the layers of what it takes to create and pursue art for these demographics.
Social media handles
@_original_magazine
Book Launch: fLIP Imperfect
What does imperfect in photography mean to you?
A fault, an error, a mistake, a miscalculation? Do you recoil from it? Do you disown it? Does it become a ‘bad photo’ or an ‘ugly photo’? Do you discard it?
Or do you embrace its agency of chance, chaos and happenstance? Maybe you see the collateral beauty in the unhappy accident? Maybe it becomes a ‘happy accident’ instead?
Whether you fear it or delight in it, imperfect is at the heart of the Summer issue of FLIP magazine, published independently by London Independent Photography @london_independent_photography
Full of insight into LIP photographers’ artistic practices, exhibitions reviews, a deep dive into the concepts of imperfect and photography, and an interview with HAPAX co-director Christiane Monarchi, fLIP is an independent voice representing a community of over 280 artists and photographers.
Antlers Volume III, Reading and Launch Party
Antlers is a publication and creative community platforming emerging female and non-binary artists working in all mediums of visual and written art. Our new issue features over 30 emerging artists from around the world. Our launch event will feature live readings of written works and an exhibition of visual works.
Social media handles:
@antlerszine
Zine Club
Turn your London snaps into a handmade zine!
Join us for our next Zine Workshop led by a pro photographer + bookmaker @felixfalckn
What to expect:
-Choose your favourite photos
-Print and design your own paper keepsake
-Trim, fold, and staple your zine by hand
-Enjoy a drink while you create in a cozy creative space
_
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
1 Zine included with your ticket
The Photobook Cafe Zine Reading Room
ZINE POP‑UP READING ROOM
Welcome to our Zine Pop‑Up Reading Room.
What’s Happening:
On the days of our zine workshops, we transform our basement gallery into a vibrant zine reading room. Seeing a selection of curated titles from our onsite collection. Admission is free and open to all. Come by to browse, flip through, and get inspired by a curated selection of independent zines.
Featured Publications Include:
Marc Vallée
Rebecca Zephyr‑Thomas
Glue Magazine
Nowhere Fast
PP Sun
Autofocus
Cringe Magazine
Cafe Royale
Facts
Suck it
Queen of the Track
…and many more shining titles.
Zine Workshops (6 PM – 8 PM):
After exploring the reading room, join our hands-on zine-making workshop. Whether you're new to zines or a seasoned maker, booking is required to secure your spot.
Zine Club
Turn your London snaps into a handmade zine!
Join us for our next Zine Workshop led by a pro photographer + bookmaker @felixfalckn
What to expect:
-Choose your favourite photos
-Print and design your own paper keepsake
-Trim, fold, and staple your zine by hand
-Enjoy a drink while you create in a cozy creative space
_
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
1 Zine included with your ticket
Book Launch: Pump
It's easy to laugh at the absurdity of bodybuilders. It's easy to call them unaware, to hottake that most of them are living out control-obsessed eating disorders. But many of us say that without confronting the control within ourselves. PUMP mirrors the messages we absorb online today: that through control, routine, and discipline, we can secure emotional safety, self-worth, and acceptance.
PUMP is the latest project from artist Alannah Cyan—a fictional 1978 bodybuilding magazine combining original photography, writing, and graphic design.
A reflection on control, discipline, and the quiet desperation that lives in many of us. Cyan uses the obsessive, cult-like lens of a 1970s bodybuilding magazine as a broader metaphor for the pursuit of emotional safety through disciplined routines and self-control.
Both surreal and sincere, PUMP is a fantasy of transformation, restraint, and the desire to become someone else. Structured around Dante’s Divine Comedy, it moves from Inferno to Paradiso through fictional ads, invented interviews, and an endless pressure to buy imagined supplements.
What begins as a parody slowly reveals itself as a devotional text to self-optimisation—not just of the body, but to the illusion of safety it promises. Come join us at the launch, where you can get your own copy of PUMP!
DRESS CODE: The year 1978
Photo and Graphic Exhibition by Soshi: Bond With
Osaka-born, London-based graphic designer Soshi will hold a photo exhibition titled “Bond with”on August 4th and 5th, 2025, 10am to 10pm at Photobookcafe in London. Through a combination of street photography and graphic work captured and created in London, the exhibition explores human connection, memory, and the emotional bonds that arise in fleeting moments.
special mix by Sou Kitahara, a Kyoto-based DJ and composer, will be played throughout the space, creating an immersive atmosphere that blends sound and image.
The merch corner will feature Soshi’s original Zine and badges, as well as handmade bags by Kiyo, an Osaka-based skate video filmmaker known for crafting one-of-a-kind pieces using a variety of fabrics and textures.
Sou Kitahara, based in Kyoto, creates music that fuses ambient textures with the structure of minimal techno. His work emphasizes intuition and experimentation, exploring the coexistence of organic emotions and mechanical form.
Kiyo, a skate video filmmaker based in Osaka, designs original handmade bags by freely combining diverse patterns and materials — no two are ever the same. Just as his video work features a range of skaters and settings, his bags reflect that same sense of individuality and layered expression through unique fabric pairings.
Social media handles
@soshi_37_
Photo and Video Exhibition: Uncertain Blue by CocoMori
Just 4.9 miles from the heart of Beijing, China's bustling capital, lies a large-scale urban village. This area is home to a large number of people who work in Beijing to earn a living—restaurant staff, delivery drivers, cleaners, the like—as well as sex workers who work within the village ( the sex work profession is not recognised and is illegal in China).
However, in May of 2025, the government announced plans to demolish and clear the village, a decision that will significantly impact the lives of many residents, forcing them to relocate and find new places to live. The exhibition 'Uncertain Blue' will feature the life scenes, faces, and voices of village residents before the demolition, captured by independent documentary filmmaker CocoMori, along with transcripts of conversations with some of the residents, as well as photos and descriptions of their spaces. Their living conditions are rarely known to the general public. Uncertain Blue ' began this spring, when the local government had yet to respond to the demolition. Everyone was in a state of uncertainty, relying on hearsay and assumptions about whether they would be demolished or impacted. When I presented my camera, their anxiety and confusion spread. As a creator, I felt such concerns overshadowed the vivid scenes in the village.
This project was made as a reflective piece, to show a life that is not far from us; they are an essential part of society and are facing repercussions. I hope that the project will raise thoughts and foster understanding between people. Additionally, the exhibition will present a short documentary film that pays homage to director Anqi Ju's experimental documentary film 'There is a Strong Wind in Beijing' (2000). Twenty-five years later, on a windy day, I entered the village with the same question: 'Do you think the wind in Beijing is strong?' It serves as the starting point, and the responses from the diverse people are varied.
Social media handles
@i_cocomori
All in a Day's Work by Jakub Dabrowski
Jakub Dabrowski
All in a Day's Work
A photographic journey of a bike packing trip taken over six months in 2024.
Over 190 days, Jakub cycled a total of 8,517km as he travelled through France, Spain, Morocco and Portugal.
All in a Day’s Work is a selection of over 200 photos which documents the landscapes, people and architecture encountered along his journey.
Social media handles
Instagram: @shotbykubi, @bylloydwood
The Photobook Cafe: Archive Launch
On July 29th we welcome all to celebrate the re launch of our Archive, seeing months of categorising, resulting in a fully accessible onsite and online Archive, housing over 1000k items with over 40 categories.
The evening will see a curated reading room and gallery display, open for all to explore.
No RSVP required.
The Photobook Cafe Archive
Our Archives' intention is to build one of the most diverse and inclusive, free public access photobook collections in the world. Accessible to everyone to explore and be a part of. Our aim is to champion photographers and small publishers by giving a platform for promotion and shared collective learning.
We are after personal projects that reflect a photographer's artistic output, whether that be a personal or commercial project. This can encompass any genre of photography, method of binding/printing, and selected publishing house, we look for uniqueness and cherish alternative or low fi printing quality.
With a firm grasp on sustaining an economical and accessible ethos, the entire collection is catalogued using Omeka systems, which allows users to view the entire collection from anywhere in the world. Paired with a free open submission process, the Archive positively supports the future academic learning on photography and self publishing.
The Archive collection is curated by The Photobook Cafe team, alongside founder Lee Williams. Donations are digitised and catalogued monthly, seeing submissions via the online portal on an ongoing basis. The Archive is celebrated within The Photobook Cafe’s public programme, seeing monthly launches, displays, reading rooms and talks. With an aim to create space for academic and personal research for artists, photographers, writers, curators, students, collectors and historians.
Find out more about The Photobook Cafe Archive which includes all of our physical photobooks held in our onsite archive, plus digital reference photobooks.
COCK FOR PRIDE
Cock For Pride: A Celebration of Queer Culture
This July, join us for an exciting and vibrant collaboration between The Photobook Café, Rapid Eye and The Cock Tavern, as we come together to celebrate Queer Culture in honour of Pride 2025!
What’s Happening
At the Cock For Pride exhibition, we’ll be showcasing a diverse group of emerging and established LGBTQIA+ artists. This multidisciplinary exhibition will ignite important conversations and amplify Queer voices on an international scale. Featured artists to be announced.
Our FREE public opening invites all to come together and celebrate diverse and underrepresented Queer talents. No RSVP required, just bring yourself, your friends, and your Pride!
Want More?
The exhibition will also be accompanied by an inspiring public programme featuring a specially curated Queer Library window display at The Photobook Café. This month, we’re highlighting works from amazing Queer publishers and creatives, including Jesse Glazzard and Marc Vallée.
The Cock Tavern
A true icon of London’s queer nightlife scene, The Cock Tavern in Kennington has long been a symbol of friendship and inclusivity. Led by Farika Holden, Patrick Black, and Leean James, the Cock brings warmth and community to the forefront. Their mantra: friendship overrides race, religion, and sexuality.
Rapid Eye
As passionate advocates for the creative process, they are proud to be part of Cock For Pride, supporting the production of artworks by LGBTQIA+ creatives and pushing the boundaries of queer representation in art. With their commitment to fostering a supportive, inclusive space, Rapid Eye Darkrooms continues to stand at the forefront of contemporary photography and printmaking.
Cock For Pride is generously supported by
The Cock Tavern @thecocktavernlondon
Rapid Eye Darkrooms @rapideye.darkroom
Zine Club
Turn your London snaps into a handmade zine!
Join us for our next Zine Workshop led by a pro photographer + bookmaker @felixfalckn
What to expect:
-Choose your favourite photos
-Print and design your own paper keepsake
-Trim, fold, and staple your zine by hand
-Enjoy a drink while you create in a cozy creative space
_
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
1 Zine included with your ticket
Yu Zoe Cui: Good Day To Marry – A Celebration of Queer Chinese Intimacy (Prelaunch + Panel Discussion)
Yu Zoe Cui is a London-based designer and artist whose work spans visual storytelling, printed matter, and participatory experiences. She creates self-initiated projects and workshops centring ESEA (East and Southeast Asian) communities. Zoe’s recent practice focuses on themes of intimacy, identity, and memory—especially Chinese queer experiences, diaspora, and female-centered narratives.
You’re warmly invited to the prelaunch of "Good Day to Marry", a deeply personal photo book celebrating Chinese queer intimacy through a series of dreamlike, surreal wedding portraits. The book features three female queer couples, captured in intimate settings that honour love, tenderness, and the quiet defiance of simply being seen.
This event is a soft opening of Yu Zoe Cui’s ongoing project—an evening to gather, reflect, and share. We’ll start with a relaxed behind-the-scenes screening, offering a glimpse into the process and stories behind the images. Following that, join us for a thoughtful panel discussion on Chinese queer love and marriage, with contributions from photographer Nandal Seo and Dr. Xumeng Xie, Lecturer at Queen Mary University.
You’ll also get to see the outcomes of Zoe’s recent participatory workshops, where participants reimagined Chinese marriage certificates through collage and creative writing—an ongoing part of the "Good Day to Marry" project that invites the community to reclaim and rewrite the language of love.
The portraits have been shortlisted for the National Portrait Gallery’s Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize, and this event marks the first time they’ll be shown publicly. Come for the stories, stay for the celebration. We can’t wait to share this moment with you.
@zozomoloko
Transformation by Benjamin Swanson
Transformation – A Handcrafted Photo Book Celebrating Nature and Change, Launching at The Photobook Café, London
Transformation is a new hand-bound photo book by Benjamin Swanson, set to launch on Thursday, July 24th at The Photobook Café in London. This limited edition of just 40 individually unique copies brings together evocative photography and the delicate beauty of hand-pressed wildflowers, each one harvested from the artist’s own garden.
Transformation is a meditation on growth, impermanence, and connection to the earth. Each copy features an original arrangement of hand-pressed flora, making no two books alike. The tactile experience is deepened by the cover, crafted from plantable seed paper, allowing the book to give life long after the pages have been turned.
The launch will be held at The Photobook Café. Attendees will have the opportunity to meet the artist, view the books in person, and purchase a signed edition.
Body・Sound・Life, The Ways of S. S. S.
Body・Sound・Life, The Ways of S. S. S.
身・聲・生
신체・소리・삶
-- A Full-day Indie Music Trail --
// // // //
Body・Sound・Life, The Way of S S S, meaning Sensing, Sharing and Seeking. The concept exploring individuals’ interaction between music, body and visualisation, extending to personal interpretations of life experiences and allowing people to find their own trajectory of "Body・Sound・Life".
We aim to unite artists from Taiwan, Korea, and the UK to share cross-cultural creation and the values of Asian indie music. We would like to invite you to enjoy the journey of discovering musical genres varieties within ourselves.
＿＿The trail includes＿＿
【Talk】11:00am - 12:30pm
> Exploring The Asian Indie Music Scene by SUPERSONIC STUDIO
【Body Workshop】1:30 - 3:00pm
> Body Movement and Physical Expression Workshop by Shiou-Fen Li & Ling
【Performance】3:00 - 4:00pm
> Sensing Discrepancy performance by Shiou-Fen Li & Ling
【Zine Making Workshop】4:30 - 6:30pm
> Synthesise Your Journey and Make Your Own Zine with SUPERSONIC STUDIO
// // // //
UK Organiser: Studio Current (@studiocurrentuk)
KR Collab Org: SUPERSONIC STUDIO (@supersonicstudiokr)
TW Collab Artists: Shiou-Fen Li (@lishioubonn), Ling (@shiun___)
Trailer (click for the link)
CAFE FM
Cafe FM is a week-long pop-up exhibition in Shoreditch blending music, art, and culture under one roof. Curated by global creative agency Golden Wolf, award winning label Take Your Medicine, and next-gen entertainment brand Doodles, it’s a collaboration built on a shared love of creativity in all its forms.
From July 14–18, step into a nostalgic, greasy-spoon-inspired space brought to life with bold visuals, unexpected sounds, and interactive experiences. Hang out, discover new music, explore immersive art, grab a drink, and maybe even pick up some exclusive merch.
"Kilometers", Book Release & Signing / Maxime La
Maxime La is a Paris-based photographer whose multicultural roots—Cambodian, French, and American—inform a culturally attuned perspective in his work, grounded in nuance and authenticity. His images search for raw narratives among his subjects or environment, and the sublime of an unfiltered reality.
“Kilometers”, published by Soft-Copy, documents an unlikely friendship established between Maxime and a taxi driver in Singapore with a deep love for food and his city. Having initially met during a six-hour layover in 2022, the book retraces Maxime's return to Singapore with KM, “Kilometers”, Seah two years later; capturing his day to day life, shared moments and meals, and the blossomed friendship that developed from his boundless optimism and appreciation for life.
Social media handles
@maxime_la published by @soft__copy
Tom Shaw A Portrait of Cricket: Book Launch and Signing
Tom Shaw is an award winning sports and portrait photographer. He spent the early part of his career as a staff photographer at Getty Images where he worked exclusively as a cricket photographer working with the England cricket team. Since leaving Getty Images over a decade ago he has established himself as a commercial photographer working with sports brands and governing bodies across the globe.
This project is a portrait of the game of cricket from across the country. The cricketing landscape has been shaped over the years by the diaspora from cricket-playing nations across the world who have brought their own passions, styles and traditions to the game. The aim is to move the narrative along from being solely the rural, leafy village green and to meet the players, spectators, volunteers, ground staff and everyone else who make the game what it is today.
THE5: A STORY OF CARE BY LETIZIA LOPREIATO
WHY AM I LAUNCHING THE5 - MY NEW CREATIVE TRADEMARK FOCUSED
ON:
CARE, LOVE, EMPATHY AND FORGIVENESS, AND WHY NOW?
The intense experience of fear linked to the diagnosis of visual impairment I received in my adulthood, triggered a radical need to get to the roots of what it meant to me to feel safe as a woman, while living with ‘disability’ and why I couldn’t feel a trace of that feeling of safety within my body until my 30s. The journey that started in 2022 it is now a three years documentary centred in THE
POWER OF STORYTELLING TO TRANSFORM OUR LIVES FROM VICTIMS INTO AUTHORS.
I therefore started researching in the realm of mythology to better portray the three main emotional domains I could sense being connected to visual impairment and to what the roots of those emotions now so violently triggered in my body truly represented:
FEAR
LOVE
CARE
FORGIVENESS
EMPATHY
AND THEIR RELATIONSHIP TO FATHEROOD AS THAT GIFT OF PRESENCE, OR
ABSENCE, that women could relate to throughout their adulthood, while stopping to think, rethink, or simply witness, their relationship with love and its dimension of safety. Mine within photography is a journey that has only been made possible by embracing my authentic self to its core, While uncovering the roots of fear and its relationship with what love meant to me, as e-motion, an energy in motion and constant evolution throughout our life. A process of discovery I would have never embarked on without what visual impairment brought to me five years ago, the call for unveiling, layer after layer of experience, my vocation for photography and in particular for visual poetry storytelling, as an art-form in its own right.
I most recently had my fourth eyes operation at Moorfields Eye Hospital in London where I had the luck and the joy to have been, truly, taken care of over. So after six years without being able to look into somebody’s eyes, as my capacity for face and colours recognition was being impaired more and more by my eye condition, my brain, but above all, my body as I now am aware of, started filling the gaps with other stories for me to ‘look at’, other stories for me to feel with other senses.
The stories of what my body, my mind and above all my energy were capable of, narrating to me through my entire body, what the presence of somebody else’s energy made me feel, and that guided me to slowly but surely, over the course of the last three years of shooting, to conclude my latest creative documentary.
A story that has become a form of self - guided meditation through, the now mono- sight lens, of my visual creative process.
I have been FEELING REALITY throughout my entire body, via a form of total
EMBODIED COGNITION, rather than just through my eyes and mind - mnemonic processes.
I ADDED OIL PAINTING TO MY PRACTICE LAST YEAR, AS A RESULT.
THE MAKING OF ME THROUGH COLOURS, AS I CAME TO DEFINE THIS ACT
OF SELF – DISCOVERY … This journey is now A TWO – SIDED STORY OF UNCONVENTIONAL CARE AND
UNCONDITIONAL LOVE, RECEIVED AND GIVEN
Between my mum and myself, a journey which for me started during a talk I had with Claire, founder of PhotoFringe 22 while I was living in Brighton, and which then continued throughout my new project’s research studies on how:
- IFS acronym for the Internal Family System psychoanalytical model
- The neuroscience of emotions; regulation
- The neuropsychology of embodied cognition
can set someone free from the triggers of CPTSD as in Complex PTSD in adulthood.
This is the story of a lived experience FROM TRAUMA TO GROWTH, that I am now
ready to start sharing, to help others living through challenging times in their lives,
TO BUILD RESILIENCE IN THEIR FEET, AND ABOVE ALL IN THEIR HANDS,
TO LEARN AND RELEARN HOW TO TRULY HOLD EACH OTHER’S HANDS, BY
KEEPING ON MOVING FORWARD, or as my Mum would say in Italian:
- POCO A POCO -
Step by step :)
With Care, Love and Respect, Letizia Lopreiato
Zine Club
Print a paper keepsake at Photobook happy hour with a pro photographer. Explore the zine history and get inspired by a vast archive located in our cafe. Whilst you have a browse grab a drink from out bar. Select phone pics to turn them into a personalized keepsake. Have a drink on us as you curate your design, send to print! The fold, staple and trim.
Booking Essential, your ticket includes 1 zine.
Visual Narratives Workshop with Xavi B
Transform Your Photography into a Cohesive Story
A single image can be powerful, but a carefully-edited series tells a story. If you’ve ever struggled with organizing your work, or turning a collection of images into a meaningful project, this workshop is for you. Join Xavi B., an experienced photographer and creative director, for a full day workshop designed to help you build a compelling visual narrative from scratch.
What You’ll Learn:
-The art of editing: How to select and sequence images to enhance storytelling.
- Visual narratives: Understanding rhythm, flow, and emotional impact in a photo series.
-From chaos to cohesion: Structuring a project from scattered images into a polished body of work.
-Laying out for publication: Bringing your project to life for digital or physical format.
Who Is This For?
Photographers looking to refine their editing and storytelling skills. Artists interested in publishing personal projects or wishing to get into zines or books. Visual storytellers who want to develop a stronger narrative voice.
Why Join?
Hands-on experience: Bring your own images and work through practical editing exercises. Small group setting: Small group for personalised feedback and guidance. Take-home insights: Learn techniques that you can apply to future projects. Spots are limited—secure your place now!
Xavier Buendia (Xavi B.) Is a freelance photographer, creative director and lens based artist originally from Mexico City. Now established in Brighton since 2009, Xavi works with independent clients on commercial assignments ranging from food & drink brands, to portrait and business documentary. His food photography has won a several awards early in his career. He now spends his time writing a newsletter on the creative process, helps photographers and creatives through mentoring and wishes to have enough time to work on his photo books and zine projects.
July 5th
10:30-17:30
Please bring with you between 16 - 40 photos printed in plain paper, no bigger than A6.
Please note our basement gallery has no step free access and 25 steps.
£40.00
Booking via Xavi