Salt Brain: The True Coastal California Culture

When most people imagine the California coast, they picture something like a postcard: surfers carving perfect waves in Malibu, bronzed bodies playing volleyball, palm trees silhouetted against glowing, pastel sunsets.

That version of the coast exists — but it’s not the whole story.

I didn’t grow up with a deep understanding of the California coast. It wasn’t until I took a job in Half Moon Bay and moved to Pacifica that I started to really get it. It wasn’t sun-soaked glamour. It was fog, salt air, crooked cottages, rusted-out trucks, weather-beaten piers, and people who have lived by the ocean for decades without ever caring what it looks like on Instagram.

What I found was a different kind of beauty — something gritty, grounded, and full of soul. I fell in love with the coast not as a backdrop, but as a culture. A way of being. One shaped by wind, water, and an unspoken understanding that the sea takes as much as it gives.

This project, Salt Brain, is my attempt to document that feeling. Not the fantasy, but the truth. The everyday details that get into your skin — and stay there.

Because once you really live on the coast, you don’t just admire it… you become part of it.