Blogging is fun – and for the one who is not in Iceland at the moment, you can always be a part of the island by looking great photos and reading news as well as personal impressions of others. In short interviews I have asked two blogger of my favorite Icelandic blogs – Snoop-Around and I heart Reykjavík – why they are blogging about and from Iceland.

SNOOP AROUND
Nanna Dís, photographer and founder of Snoop-Around (and her personal website ladyandbug) „Snoop-Around“ is a website with great interviews and photo stories from Iceland.

What ´s the idea of Snoop-Around?
In the beginning I was looking for something to do. I wasn’t sure what exactly, but I liked photography, art, interior design etc. and I read a lot of blog’s, especially related to people and their space (work, home). I was fascinated and you could say I loved to snoop around in other people’s lives. I started Snoop-Around in March last year, it started small as a side project but late last year I decided to change the website, got more people to take part in the project, added video interviews and later we started doing shorter coverage, by visiting events and festivals.

What is the speciality of this project?
What is special about this project is that the focus is on creative people living here in Iceland, and they show us what they’re working on and their working environment. We try our best to show the individual in a new light and at the same time make it more interesting for the reader.
It also is a growing collection of Iceland´s finest and creative people!

And tell me something about you and your work. What was the most interesting/special meeting you´ve had for Snoop-Around?
I have always been into design and I studied technical drawing and planned on studying architecture. While working at architecture firms over summer holidays I found out that it was not what I wanted to do so I got into Reykjavik School of Visual Art where I studied art and design for one year. There I learned the basics in photography and little after I bought my first DSR digital camera and started experimenting. Then I began using Photoshop again and as is common to begin with, I started over-working the photos, high contrast, crazy colours etc! But gradually you learn to cool it down, less is more as they say :)
I do like to create themes and all the interviews on Snoop-Around have a different feel to them. It just goes with the mood I´m in and I´m always evolving, both as a photographer and in other media.
It is hard to say which interview was the most memorable, as these individuals we have talked to seem to be all very different from each other. I´ve mostly enjoyed getting to know these people and I´m so thankful for their time, stories and willingness to share.

I HEART REYKJAVÍK

I heart Reykjavík is a one´s person guide to Reykjavík by Auður. She is a blogger since 2003 and most of that time she has been writing about life in Reykjavík seen with her eyes. She has been working for the same company in Reykjavík for more than 6 years but this autumn she’ll be leaving her job and starts a new chapter in her life. She has plans to go back to school but everything else is quite uncertain.

What ´s the idea of your blog?
The idea behind I heart Reykjavík is pretty simple – with a changed financial landscape in Iceland and limited time to travel as much as I used to, I wanted to try and experience Reykjavík as it was a new destination and share my findings with whoever wanted to read about it.

What is the speciality of this project?
The difference between I heart Reykjavík and other similar blogs is probably just me and my personality. I’ve been working in tourism for a long time and I’m an active couchsurfing host so I feel like I have a good feeling of what kind of information people might be looking for about Reykjavík and maybe not finding. I try to seek out things that you can’t read about in typical guide books and I try to be honest and true to myself in everything I write. Because I don’t get paid for writing the blog, I feel it’s much easier to accomplish this.

What was the most interesting, special experience of blogging?
What has been the most amazing thing about the blog has been meeting all kinds of interesting people and realizing that in general – people are just really really nice. It’s also great to discover how fun it can be to play a tourist in your own city and I’m always discovering something new and exciting.