More often than not, Washington, D.C., is associated with power and politics, with a dash of fireworks and monuments thrown in for good measure. That stereotype of the capital is exactly what photographer Bill Crandall avoids in his mysterious compositions of the District’s neighborhoods. His camera isn’t in the press pool but is turned on the “real city where people live.”

A native to the D.C. area and a current resident of Petworth, a neighborhood in Northwest D.C., Crandall recalls the first Metro stations opening in the 70s and coming of age during the heyday of the D.C. punk scene in the 80s. He’s seen the city change a lot. Many areas that once had a “kind of sleepy dereliction”