When we started the Bee, we wanted to use photographs showing working-class people  with a range of emotions, and not the black-and-white sullenness many documentary photographers seem to look for in working-class areas. 

We love how @carminarip’s pictures capture glimpses of smiles, grins and laughter in day-to-day settings, so we asked her to help us celebrate the festive season with some of her favourite moments of everyday joy.

“What makes people smile? It must often be other people,” she tells us. “But taking people’s photographs has taught me something else. 

“When I take the pictures, I talk to them about their lives, and when they start telling me about themselves, that’s often when they relax and smile. I think it’s partly being allowed to talk about themselves and what they do  that makes them smile, because people don't get that chance much do they?  That applies across all ages as well.

“When we’re talking I find that time slows right down, somehow. I really try to make a photo that encapsulates that little moment

“It’s nice to be noticed, and just to be listened to for a bit, isn’t it?”

1 Women at the Window
What I like about this picture is that, looking at it, you might think all the women in the picture, including me, knew each other, but we didn’t. I’d just met the three women looking through the window of this pub as I was contemplating how I’d be received if I went in and started taking pictures. In fact, they encouraged me to do it (that’s why they’re looking through the window). The woman counting her change didn’t know the woman waving at the three women outside, who in turn didn’t know the women she was waving at! We all came together in a happy mix. I think there’s a lot of humanity in it; it’s a natural impulse to wave and smile, even at strangers. By the end we all felt like we knew each other anyway.

2 Father and Daughter
I’d first met this man on the clifftop, where he was walking alone, barefoot in the grass on the most beautiful of summer days. I took his picture because he was so striking, and then he told me his wife and child were down on the beach, and asked if I could photograph them as well. I loved how proud he was at showing off his little girl, and I liked how bossy she was – understandably, she didn’t care about the photo at all, she just wanted her father to stop talking to this strange person and play with her in the sand. I think he really wanted the moment captured, though. I felt he was conscious of how lucky he was to be there, on that summer day with the people he loved most in the world, and it seemed almost natural that someone should just happen to be there to document that joy.

3 The Christmas Jumpers
There’s a café in Bridlington which I like because it’s open every day; they have the longest menu I’ve ever seen (which I know isn’t always a good thing, but sometimes it is), and they let dogs in. So I often go in hoping to find a photogenic dog sitting at a table, but that day, just before Xmas, I met the cleaner and an amorous punter. I got the feeling they weren’t actually a couple before I took the pictures, but by the end of my time with them I definitely decided they might be. She was so cheerful, festively dashing around the tables, wiping the surfaces, and he was just happy to have her around. There was a lot of flirting and innuendo, and I was happy to encourage it. There was a lovely little spark between them, which I like to think was ignited by my shutter clicking.

4 Woman Looking at a Red Dress in a Window
This was a quick shot because the woman was smiling to herself and I didn’t want to miss it. Her dog looking at her reminded me of Walt Disney’s Cinderella, and I imagined the dog turning into the coach driver to take her to the ball in the red dress. Of course, I didn’t mention any of that when I spoke to the woman. She said she thought it was a beautiful dress, and added she’d love to wear something like that, but in reality never would.

5 Northern Soul
I took this at one of the monthly Northern Soul nights in Hornsea, where I live. My eldest brother, who knows a thing or two about Northern Soul, had warned me old soulies can be very protective of their scene, and might not welcome me taking my camera, but he couldn’t have been more wrong. They were very welcoming and proud, and they were keen for me to photograph them dancing. This is a portrait, though, and one of my favourites. There was his whole Northern Soul history in ink on his forearms, and while that became the focus of the picture, I think his face tells you what a great night he was having. He was dressed up, with his people, and dancing to the music he’s loved all his life – that’s going to make any man smile.

6 The Girl and the Moon
It was January when I met this girl with her friend, on one of those clear, pink-skied winter evenings that you know will bring frost. Although you can’t see it too well in the photo, the moon was massive and seemed to pearlise everything. I thought she was such a beautiful girl, and her clothes were of the same hues as the sky, so it was almost as though she was meant to be photographed there. Her friend was less confident, and when I sent them both the pictures later – which looked so happy – she asked not to have her picture shown anywhere. It felt a very serene moment on the beach on that cold, crisp night, and I love how enigmatic she looks in this picture. I did think when I left them, though, that if I’d been her mother I’d have begged her to have worn a coat! It was January on the east coast after all – and it may have been magical, but it was nithering!

7 A Smile is Just a Frown Turned Upside Down
It was at a country music tribute festival when the rain came down so hard, and, as they say in country parlance, "like a cow pissin’ on a flat rock". It was all a bit overwhelming. Adults, let alone children, looked like they didn’t quite know how to handle their emotions. This little girl was swept up by her mum and she really didn’t know whether to cry or laugh. Shania Twain (aka Nicola Marie Harris) had been brought to a sudden, fizzling end by the deluge. It really was a matter of whether you laughed or cried. I think the girl wanted to laugh and smile at the camera, like the rest of her family, but that frown refused to turn upside down and the result was a face as stormy as the weather. However, if you look just to the right you can see her friend was managing to see the funny side, and with a little bit of cajoling I think in the end she managed that too.

8 Ladies (and dog) in Christmas Outfits
I assume that a conversation had taken place between these three friends where it was decided that they should all dress in Xmas costumes for their meet-up that morning. I think the lady in red and fur probably made the call. Elf lady was very keen, I reckon, but I think the lady in the black coat and reindeer antlers probably needed a bit more convincing, and I’m sure me walking past with a camera was the very last thing she had on her Christmas list. I think the dog had a cataract, so he’s looking at the world through a semi-opaque lens anyway, and seemed quite happy to be photographed – I would say he’s almost smiling, in fact. The whole ensemble makes me smile. It was just one of those funny moments that, without a camera, you’d probably notice but just walk past, or continue to think about how to make parsnips taste nice. I was just happy to catch it, and at least three-quarters of the group look happy to have their moment documented.

9 North Face
There’s a small underpass in my town that runs underneath a little section of the Pennine Way, and that day, as I was walking my dog, I bumped into a group of kids there. They were just hanging around, listening to music and fooling about amidst the knob graffiti and puddles of pee, as you do in an underpass. They were really interested in the camera I was holding, and they were really up for having photos taken. This is the generation who take photos of themselves all the time, so it was heartwarming to see how thrilled they were to have pictures taken by someone else with a camera that didn’t look like a phone. They weren’t at all self-conscious and just naturally fell into happy, sassy posing. This girl had startling blond hair and I thought the contrast of that with the dark tunnel worked well in black and white. They were all so excited to see the pictures – you’d have thought they’d never had a photo taken before. They were very sweet and I felt happy to have made them feel happy.

10 The Aunties
I met one of the older ladies in this picture outside a toilet block on a very hot day, and I asked to take her portrait against the blue sky. I didn’t realise that she was waiting for the rest of her family: her sister and their niece and nephew. When they came out, they were surprised to see her having an impromptu photo shoot with a stranger. The nephew was particularly amused, and also slightly embarrassed by this, but the aunties were so excited and insisted that he and his sister pose for a family portrait. They were so good-natured about it, but I did feel sympathy for the boy – my own son is mortified at the thought of me taking pictures of strangers and won’t let me anywhere near him with my camera – but this lad and his sister smiled dutifully and showed real affection for their aunties, who had taken them over to Bridlington from West Yorkshire for the day. I think having it recorded was quite special for them. It felt like it meant a lot, that day out for them together, so I was pleased I caught a fleeting moment of it as a little souvenir.

11 The Christmas Kiss
So here they are again, but in this shot I think the camera turned into mistletoe and emboldened him to give her a smacker on the lips, which to me looks well received. I love a happy ending, and there’s so much Christmas fun in this one. I like to think of them still dancing round the tables, splashing cleaning fluid together and stealing kisses.

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