Annie Leibovitz turned up to take our family photo

Annie Leibovitz has captured many of the world’s most famous faces. Francois Bayers received an email from a PR firm saying they wanted to photograph his family for a campaign for Ikea. Francois lives with his partner Joanne and their two children Jack, aged five, and Lowri, three, in St Davids. Annie Leibovitz is arguably the most celebrated celebrity photographer working today.

Born in Connecticut in 1949, she began working as a photographer at Rolling Stone magazine in the early 1970s. In 1983 she moved on to Vanity Fair. One of her best known images was, at the time, also her most controversial - a naked and heavily pregnant Demi Moore. Francois Leibovitz was approached by Ikea to show his wife Annie’s work.

After six months of correspondence, Annie arrived at the family home. Francois said he only really believed it was happening when she arrived at their home. He said: “A black Mercedes van pulled up, and there she was in real life,” The photo selected for the campaign was actually taken in the family’s boot room. I was just gobsmacked.

She was enigmatic, charismatic and just so friendly. said Francois. The next morning they met at 06:00 on the nearby beach to begin work. The image is now part of Ikea’s campaign which features 25 real-life households photographed by Leibovitz across seven countries.

Before she left, she gave Francois a copy of her book, Annie Lebovitz at Work, which she had signed for the children. In the book she had written: “To Jack and Lowri, what a beautiful place you live in, love Annie. We can never take another family photo - nobody’s ever going to live up to taking a family photo of us now, this is it. We canNever take another Family photo - Nobody’s Ever going to Live Up to This.

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