The Story
The story of the POLAROID ORIGINALS FILM is almost as unbelievable as it is impossible. In order to understand this product`s true nature, please allow us to serve you a condensed short version of how it all started:
The impossible journey origins in the year 2003 with the very first instant self portrait Florian Kaps took with an old Polaroid Camera from the flea market 1. Immediately, he was addicted to the mysterious magic of this incredible material and started to dive deeper. Surprisingly the world, including the Polaroid management itself, seemed to have totally lost faith in the relevance of instant film. You could hardly find any supply, there was no real communication and it seemed clear that the days of Polaroids were counted.
For Florian an unacceptable situation that simply had to be changed. Together with his long-time business partner in crime, the famous Webmeister aka Andreas Eduard Hoeller, he founded the UNVERKAEUFLICH Trading Company (unfortunately destroying the notaries table with aggressive developer paste from old Polaroid film when they instantly documented the founding ceremony) in spring 2005.2
Only a few months later, Webmeister proudly launched their first online shop, 3 and in the following years they became the worlds biggest online retailer, specialized in Polaroid film. (honestly not a too big challenge, as basically they were the only one)
During this time they had the pleasure to discover that they were NOT the only maniacs who passionately love analog & instant, but that there was an exponentially increasing number of people of all ages who re-discovered the magic of analog instant photography in a more and more digital world.4
Then the SHOCK: Polaroid informed the world about the end of the production of their instant films. Within the year 2008, the very last factory in Enschede, NL would close its doors forever.
For almost one year, Florian Kaps tried to fight this frightening decision, but the best he could get was an invitation for the closing event on June 14th, 2008.5
There he met Andre, 6 the production manager of this amazing plant, and suddenly everything changed. He told him about the incredible re-discovery of analog instant film all over the world and the incredible potential of the next generation of analog customers. And Andre told him about his secret experiments and the slight chance to re-invent a new analog instant film if they only could save the factory. Within 1 year he and his best 10 team members would be able to produce a new film material.
So they restarted the fight for the factory and with the help of the FBI (another thrilling story) they finally ended up as proud owners of the very last Polaroid factory and started THE IMPOSSIBLE PROJECT. 6 months later, in 2009, the very first NEW and truly IMPOSSIBLE lab test analog instant picture (showing chief chemical wizard Martin) slowly developed in their trembling hands. In 2010 they finally were able to proudly present the very first real IMPOSSIBLE INSTANT FILM, the PX 100, to the world. Since 2018, the film is back on the market under its one and only birth name: Polaroid Originals.
