Birds are chirping, golden hour is at hand, and yet an eerie stillness creeps the air as Delphine Jamet approaches the abandoned property she’s about to explore.
Hidden amongst one of Perth’s oldest neighbourhoods sits a dilapidated house from 1905, set for demolition, and soon to be forgotten.
Years of sunshine and weather have eroded its once-pristine architecture.
Yet even in a state of decay its structure still remains imposing, presenting remains of a forgotten era.
Unfortunately, Jamet’s usual means of entrance has since been boarded up, only its destroyed front doorframe allows for a small peek inside, and one can only imagine the stories and memories that whisper within its walls.
Urban exploration, or urbex as it’s more commonly referred to among the community, has regularly been linked alongside negative terms such as vandalism, trespassing, and transgression, particularly given its rise on social media lately.
But there’s another side to this niche sub-culture that often gets overlooked and challenges this stigma.
Urbex is a deeply reflective and often respectful form of practice which allows people to engage with a decaying environment that the rest of society has forgotten.
As humans, we’re naturally curious creatures who are drawn to explore the unknown.
Those who genuinely participate in the practice of Urbex-ing for the right reasons venerate the places they visit, and decry any vandalism or damage left behind.
Why?
Because of Urbexology’s number one rule:
“Take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footprints.“
Jamet has been exploring forgotten places since the year 2000 and is considered a veteran of the local Urbex scene.
Passionate and respectful, she and other urban explorers like herself move skillfully through silent, skeletal remains of old buildings, treating any remnants of the past they find with revere as if not to disturb the ghosts of the past as they go.
“I’m trying to feel the gaps in history, in a sense,“ said Jamet.
“I mean, some of the things we see inside the house is absolutely mind-blowing. Recently, I [saw] wallpaper full of planes from World War One!
Some explorers may even get lucky enough to be able to capture what some would call ‘the moment’ of abandonment, a final snapshot frozen in time.
An old toy, a faded photo or even dinnerware left on the table sparks questions: Who left this behind? What was their story?
Urbex does not come without its legal risks.
The lines between exploration and trespassing are blurred, and it’s up to the responsibility of the different people engaging in the community to handle or navigate these boundaries as they participate
In W.A, trespassing can lead to fines up to $12,000 or even jailtime.
Jamet runs her own website, streetkidindustries.com, and a Facebook page called Abandoned Western Australia, as a way to educate and inform newcomers on safe, respectful exploring.
WA police have contacted Jamet at times, to help spread messages to the community and deter risky behaviour.
“Every now and then I get asked to pass a message to people in the urbex community: please take your photos down, do not go there, and places are not abandoned even if they may look abandoned,” Jamet said.
The last year or so has started to see the local Urbex scene trending on social media, particularly on popular platforms such as TikTok.
This has ultimately brought in a new wave and generation of urban explorers.
Not all though who may be in it for the same initial and genuine reasons as their predecessors, motivated more by clicks rather than curiosity.
While urbex-ers like Jamet and others try to safeguard places by not posting their locations publicly online, but when users post and upload videos of where they’ve been, it doesn’t take long for these so-called hidden places to become not so hidden any more.
*James – whose name has been changed for the purpose of this article – has been a part of the online Urbex community for little over a year now. At twenty-years-old he considers himself more on the older, mature side than most of their members.
Speaking on some of the negative behaviour and activity online he said.
“It definitely does bring all the other urban explorers down, reputation wise that is.”
James said those who do this hopefully are simply going through their typical adolescent phase of rebellion, and this behavior is something that will come to pass and mature with age.
“It’s definitely the older community that being around 17 plus or the ones that have actual heads screwed on that’ll definitely back off and respect boundaries.”
Jamet thinks social media has made things “a lot more dangerous”.
“People pushing the limits, most importantly people so desperate to be seen on TikTok and have fame that they forced their way into buildings.”
Discovering an online community for urbexing appears to encourage this universal human urge to explore, as she added “a lot more people now more than ever especially the younger generation are actually interested in the history part of it and share the information as well as research it.”
While some might choose to put their energies into stamp collecting or bird watching, others choose to make meaning and explore abandoned places.
