We investigate physics of soft condensed matter at the micron scale. Soft materials have many peculiar properties that we experience ever day. These properties arise from the behavior of particles with sizes  of around a micrometer, much larger than molecules; yet the collective behavior of these particles shows analogies to molecular systems that are of general interest. Examples are crystallization and phase separations, solid and liquid-like behavior, elastic and plastic properties. The large length and time scales of soft matter allow us to obtain direct insight into the “atomic scale”. Using three-dimensional microscopic imaging and light scattering we bridge length scales from the particle scale to macroscopic lengths, thereby linking the microscopic behavior of these materials to their macroscopic properties.