After a day working hard in a Hampshire laboratory, slouching on the sofa and binge-watching Netflix is insufficient entertainment for chemist Archie Williams.
Instead, he laces up his heavy duty boots, packs his rucksack with a torch, updates his phone with a map of abandoned buildings, and heads off into the night.
Urban explorer Archie, 22, has visited more than 600 abandoned sites since he started scouting schools, convents, hospitals, observatories, power stations and other dilapidated buildings ten years ago.
It can be dangerous and he has to watch out for rusty nails through the boots and broken glass, though those are the least of his problems.
‘I’ve had people who have come out with guns before and people who have fired warning shots. You’d be surprised by how many people in this country carry firearms when they aren’t supposed to,’ he says.
‘Quite often you will find what we call ‘time capsules’, which is a house that has been abandoned with literally everything left behind. You can walk into a house that hasn’t been inhabited for 30 years and it’s as if the residents just walked away and have not come back
‘Everything’s in there from personal possessions and sensitive stuff to old washing machines, microwaves. They are mundane things, but they have been left to decay and have things growing out of them.’
The locations Archie visits are kept top secret so they are not taken over by vandals or looters. He wants other urban explorers to be able to have a look around before buildings are developed or demolished.
‘I’ve had countless messages from people asking us to steal things we’ve found and sell it to them. But we don’t do that. That’s not our thing,’ he says.
‘The ethos is do not break, do not take. Some people call it TOPLOF, which means take only photos, leave only footsteps. There is nothing illegal about it. By English civil trespass laws, you’re allowed in anywhere that has an open route of access.’
He has also been chased by dogs, security guards and has become used to run-ins with the law.
‘We’ve had the police turn up countless times. But we’re not breaking any laws so we just explain what we are doing and go on our way,’ Archie, who always explores in a group, says.