Why living in an Instagram hotspot isn’t picture perfect
Alice Johnston, a longtime resident of the London neighbourhood of Notting Hill, which is the setting for the Julia Roberts film of the same name, has found its growing popularity as a tourist hotspot comes with highs and lows.
With its pastel-painted row houses, the area has become a popular destination as a background for Instagram pics, and Johnston has seen all kinds of crazy behaviour as visitors snap their photos.
Johnston says there are some good stories, like the day she and a friend were walking his French bulldog. A tourist asked if they could “borrow” the dog for a photo and as a thank you for the snap, Johnston’s friend received five pounds.
But, Johnston says other moments were less wholesome.
“I was once woken up at 6am on Easter Sunday by French teenagers taking pictures outside,” she says.
“One time I was changing after I got out of the shower and there was an elderly man taking a picture (of my windows) with an iPad.”
Although her shutters were closed during that incident, she says she was still rattled by the experience.
With the influx of visitors to one pale-pink house near where she lives, Johnston says the nearby residents have given up trying to keep them away. Instead, they’ve installed a donation box asking visitors for a donation to charity in exchange for a photo.
As busy and inconvenient as it can be, Johnston says she tries to be sympathetic to travellers visiting her hometown and recalls how she loved doing the same thing while visiting the Marais in Paris.
“I love to travel, so I have to be pretty understanding when people travel to where I live, and I feel lucky that it’s cool enough that people want to come where I live,” she says.
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