A word from the author :

The idea for a book in which I would share anecdotes from my visits came to me in 2018. I started writing a few: those about the theater in Cuba, the train graveyards in Hungary and the car graveyards in Sweden, the sawmill in Taiwan, the palace in Portugal, and the hotel in Japan. When Valérie Dumeige, the editorial director of Éditions Arthaud, contacted me at the end of 2020, I was about to move on to the swimming pool in Italy (page XX of this book). She proposed publishing Urbex Monde, a book presenting, through photos but especially through stories, the thirty-five abandoned sites that I consider the most beautiful and interesting around the world. At that time, I was already considering creating Jonk Éditions (quickly renamed Éditions Tempus Fugit), but since Arthaud is a prestigious publishing house, I accepted. Since the six locations mentioned earlier were among the thirty-five, I decided to donate them to Urbex Monde.

In parallel, and during the successive lockdowns, I prioritized another project: After Winter. This book required numerous exchanges with Amélie Gressier, who wrote it, and there’s nothing like a period when we’re both fully available to make progress.

Urbex Monde and After Winter were published in 2022. However, I never stopped writing down the occasional anecdote from my visits. Partly to remember certain details, but also because I still had my Urbex Stories project in mind, which, incidentally, didn’t yet have a name.

We arrive at 2023, the year that marks ten years of my practice of photographing abandoned places. This milestone deserves to be celebrated with a retrospective book, which was published that year. This is how The Lost World came to be, a best-of compilation of a decade of exploration in abandoned places, organized by major themes: religious, medical, industrial, etc., but also by subjects that particularly resonate with me: textures, shapes, perspectives, staircases…

Since Naturalia, my main project, is published every three years, it’s only logical that after a first volume in 2018 and a second in 2021, the third should be released in 2024.

Then I had to decide whether Urbex Black & White or Urbex Stories would be published first. I opted for the black and white book, which contains less text, thus giving me more time to write the Urbex Stories. A few anecdotes are ready, but the bulk of the work remains to be done. So I have to delve back into my archives and my memory, some of the visits dating back almost 10 years, to present what I hope will be a journey alongside me into the world of abandoned places.

Since spring 2025, some have had the opportunity to join me on my Urbex Tours, exploring abandoned places. Over four days, in small groups of four, I offer an immersive experience in my work as a ruin hunter. This book is a way to bring more people with me into the unique, intriguing, and for some, frightening world of urbex.

With Urbex Stories, I want to reveal what lies behind my photos. From location scouting and travel to on-site approaches, post-processing, and the life of a photographer, I’ve tried to select stories that give the reader a complete picture of my world. Of course, the majority of the stories focus on the visits themselves and the adventures they brought. From encounters with property owners or security guards to meetings with guard dogs or wild animals, not to mention experiences with weapons or near misses, a lot happens behind the images seen on social media, in books, or at exhibitions.

This is just a fraction of the twenty stories recounted here; I’ll leave the rest as a surprise. Spoiler alert, though: there’s a reference to American History X that still sends shivers down my spine, some rather unfriendly Russians encountered in Italy, a punch, a prostitute, an alarm, broken equipment, racism—in short, enough to make you want to join me on my tours!

Through this book, I also hope to convey my love of old buildings, to share my passion for this spectacle of time passing and leaving its mark on everything. This mark of wear and tear, of decay, these markers of time gone by that I keep mentioning but will write again here: rusted iron, peeling paint, dust, broken glass, and of course, nature’s return, create fabulous settings. For me, at least, and I hope for you too when you close this book. Enjoy your reading and immerse yourself in my world!