How the English "plushkins" live

What is not piled up in the rooms: rotting food, clumps of hair, faulty appliances… In the homes of these "thrifty people" there are rarely guests, the owners are ashamed of their mess.

Photographer Paula Salischiker was invited to the homes of "collectors" who are afraid to get rid of junk, for filming in London and Essex. These unfortunate people have created their own support group to jointly deal with their oddities.

Inside the house of a resident of England who collects trash.

Deep down in their hearts, the "English plushkins" realize that it is not normal when a person cannot part with things. After seeing the photos of Paula, some were amazed, they could not believe that it was their homes in the pictures, so they got used to the mountains of things and junk.

Some of those who came to the group were forced to leave their homes, because they could no longer deal with their trash.

Paula says: "Some of the people I filmed were very ashamed of what was happening at their home. They have a good job and a good standard of living. For them, the very thought of someone breaking into their homes was unbearable.

When something breaks, say, a stove or a washing machine, they cannot call a master to fix it, and everything remains in the same condition.

I can't imagine how some of the things from their "collections" could be used, but it seemed obvious to them that it would all come in handy someday and they should be stored."

While some were ashamed of their homes, others thought that everything was in order and it should be so. The mess became invisible to them. And only my photos opened their eyes to the obvious, they did not see the forest behind the trees. One did not even believe that his house was depicted in the photo.

Recently, in the Diagnostic and Statistical Handbook of Mental Disorders in England, this condition was classified as a mental disorder that is not one of the states of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and it was recognized that there was no appropriate treatment.

The group, which meets in London, is the first of its kind and gives help and advice to participants from all over the country who are trying to fight against their tendency to accumulate.