Hey, I’m Phil from Germany with a neverending urge to explore.
In spring 2016 me and my friend had the idea and curiosity to enter an abandoned house in our neighborhood. The two of us didn’t expect that this was the start of our passion for Urban Exploration. Since then I took a lot of pictures and uploaded them here on this website.
Although I’m continuing alone today my ambition for this hobby never went away and probably never will.
My goal is to explore every abandoned place I find, no matter how small. This is why I have pictures of many unique locations uploaded which most explorers wouldn’t even bother exploring. Even if they aren’t that interesting sometimes they still have some special appeal and make for a few great pictures.
I tend to give away an approximate location of my places by tagging city names in my posts. I don’t want to keep my discoveries completely secret and like to give other Urbexers the opportunity to find these locations with a little effort. I locate my Lost Places via Google Maps or by just driving around most of the time.
More about me: short QnA
Your name, country and age?
I’m Phil from Thuringia, Germany. I was born in 2001 (so 22 at the time I was writing this).
When and why did you start?
It all started out with my former friend in school. We both went to the same class and had been friends before we started doing Urbex. In early 2015 we both were interested in shooting ‘funny’ short movies in our hometown. One day after school we went to an abandoned house, which we planned to use in our film. Neither of us had been in an abandoned building before, so it was the first time ever. As soon as we were in, we somehow forgot about shooting our film and instead were occupied with exploring the place. It really fascinated us; it was something we hadn’t seen or experienced in our lives; it stuck in our minds. Coming home, we both learned about Urban Exploring and the things connected to it, and the focus shifted from filming funny clips to filming the exploration of these places (at least this was the plan). The first real Urbex we did was actually fully filmed, but we didn’t like the film format because it was too distracting from the exploration itself (talking especially). My focus shifted to taking pictures with the old camera of my dad and I noticed it was exactly the thing I wanted to do. My friend didn’t take pictures, but always helped me find great motives.
Motivation?
I think curiosity is the main driving force behind my explorations. When I see a building, I want to know what’s behind these walls and what discoveries can be made in it. However, the whole atmosphere is an important factor too, it’s addictive. The post-apocalyptic feeling, the melancholy, the dead silence, but also the beauty and the calm: it’s a weird but fascinating mix you experience in those places. There is a passion for the old architecture and machinery of these buildings as well, sometimes it’s like a trip with a time machine. I also like to document these places for the afterworld and try to deliver a fracture of the things I experience while exploring through the pictures. I could talk for hours about the experience of Urban Exploration, but I try to keep it briefly summarized here. Even if I primarily take the images for myself to remember and relive my trips, I’m always happy to share them, that’s why I created the website in the first place. With the website I want to inform, document, but also hopefully inspire other people, whatever you get out of it. If the website inspired you to do or think about something, well it reached its goal.
Why the name?
Until 2018, I used my online pseudonym, but as my friend got more and more involved in the whole process, we wanted to have a more general name. We couldn’t come up with any bright ideas and somehow ended up with Eastern Exploration, because we’re mostly exploring things in the eastern part of Germany and just stuck with it. After we parted ways in life I continued to do the project alone in 2023, but I will keep the name.
How do you discover these places?
The search is done on Google Maps by scanning villages for places that look like they could be abandoned from a bird’s-eye view. I check it out in real life and if it’s really abandoned, I try to find a way in, explore it and take the pictures. Many places are also well known on the internet or some I find by driving around. It’s quite often that you go somewhere else but you see abandoned places on the way, so I mark them for later.
What do you take with you on Urbex?
I personally think that most photography equipment isn’t very suitable for my purposes. My motto is: The less you take with you, the better. I just take a light, a wide-angle or universal lens and my camera with me. If the whole place isn’t as dangerous I sometimes use a tripod. In my opinion, the quality of the images is enough to show what they should communicate. I got to admit, I am way more focused (and interested) on capturing the atmosphere than getting all the technical stuff right. Yes, many pictures are blurry or technically not well done, but I don’t care too much about it as long as I still feel that the picture is interesting. I hate fiddling with tripods and stuff, it just limits my ability to choose an angle and overall mobility. If you really have to run or flee, those things can become quite an obstacle. Other things unrelated to photography that I take (or really should take more often) with me are gloves, work boots, knives (you never know) and a respirator for concealed basements and tunnels.
Which camera?
I once used a Fujifilm FinePix HS50EXR, which was a great camera to start with in my opinion. However, I upgraded to a Canon EOS 70D in 2020.
What programs?
I mostly use Lightroom nowadays, it does all I need, but in extreme cases I also use Photoshop. Before 2018, in the first two years, I used Corel Paintshop for editing.
Favorite location yet?
Probably the Fürstenhof in Eisenach. It’s one of the nicest locations to explore, it has everything an abandoned place should have and deliver in order to make a great exploration. From a very complex floor layout, a great atmosphere, an interesting history and nice motives, it really has it all for a good adventure.