Submit Saturdays: Photographer Angelo Spagnolo on his low-fi, simple aesthetic

We are thrilled to launch Submit Saturdays, a year long series of articles in partnership with Squarespace. Be it a professional work website, a shop, a social enterprise or a site that hosts a personal project, Submit Saturdays will showcase the work of creatives around the world who use the online platform Squarespace. This is a great new opportunity to share your projects and ideas with our readers.

Angelo Spagnolo’s gorgeous photography portfolio caught our eye for its brave, disquieting work and its slick, minimal presentation. He first fell in love with photography at journalism school, but only starting making work he felt he liked after finishing college. “My mother had a darkroom when I was growing up and I didn’t even take the time to learn,” he tells us. We wanted to find out more about his work and what makes him tick.

What are the best things to shoot for you?
My friends, and people with great style in general. Also cats. 

What do you usually shoot with?

The 35mm work on my site is all shot on the Yashica T4 or the Nikon N90s. In the past year or two I’ve really been focused on developing my style on the Instax 210 and the Instax mini. Also, I shoot a ton on the iPhone.  

What influences and defines the aesthetic of your work, and your site design?
My aesthetic is influenced by my adolescence, skateboarding, just trying to do reckless shit and act like a kid always. My site design, like my photography, is really built around having no skills haha. I have these tools, camera, computer, etc. and I try to use them as simply as possible and not get wrapped up in process.

How do you translate your often lo-fi, house party vibe and aesthetic into commercial projects?
I’ve been lucky that the commercial work I’ve done has been with brands that let me do my thing. My approach has always been to have fun first, and then just document. If that fun happens to be built around a collection of clothing or product, it’s still about a good group of people being themselves and having a good time.

Tell me a bit more about your grimy living side project…

Grimy Living started as a blog just to kind of focus on the pictures I was taking, styling little one off editorials with my friends. Then I made T-shirts (and got a Grimy Living tattoo) and it morphed into kind of a brand. It’s been dormant for awhile but the next evolution is actually coming to fruition as we speak.

What do you have planned for the year ahead?
Trying to make more time for side projects, skate a ton, make clothes and images and books and friends and love. 



If you host your work on a Squarespace website and would like to be featured as part of this series of articles, please head here to learn more and get in touch.

In partnership with Squarespace

Squarespace is a creation tool enabling individuals to create a great website by giving them the tools to create an elegant solution and get their voice heard in the world of online publishing. Whether for experienced designers or for someone putting together their first website, it makes forming a beautiful platform simple.

If you’re not currently using Squarespace to host your site, the kind folks over there are offering It’s Nice That readers 10% off their services. Sign up here or upgrade your account using the discount code SUBMIT to get 10% off.