Wylie’s Baths, a photographic essay: Published in Jetstar

Words and images by Jonathan Camí

Wylie’s Baths Photographic Essay

Sydney’s nostalgic tidal ocean pool, Wylie’s Baths, is a local secret, often overlooked by travellers in favour of nearby Coogee or Bondi Beaches. Summer or winter, it’s a scenic escape.

Catalan-born photographer Jonathan Cami loves Wylie’s Baths for its thoroughly Australian ambience. “I’m from Barcelona, on the Mediterranean Sea,” he says. “We don’t have rock pools, nor do we have tides in our sea, and sadly we haven’t kept any of the old beach baths in my hometown.

My Australian partner showed me this heritage- listed place, with its old- fashioned sea baths and a rock pool with clear water, and I fell in love with it. It’s different from Bondi Beach, which is sometimes overcrowded – it’s off the tourist trail, populated by locals only. Maybe this is the reason for its unique atmosphere.

I wanted to shoot a story here where the pool and landscape are the protagonists; where people are part of the story, but not the main subject.” 

Wylie’s Baths were established in 1907 and named after Henry Alexander Wylie, a champion long-distance swimmer. A cliff top kiosk sells coffee, snacks, swimwear, goggles and sunscreen, as well as Wylie’s Baths merchandise. Meanwhile an elevated, boomerang- shaped timber deck gives panoramic views of the Pacific Ocean: it’s the perfect spot to whale-watch each year from May to July.