Cherry blossom in West Smithfield

Cherry blossom in West Smithfield
(garden to the left and Smithfield market in background)
11.5" x 17", pen and sepia ink and coloured pencils in Moleskine Sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell - all rights reserved

I've just returned to London and seeing all the cherry blossom everywhere reminds me very much of a pleasant hour or so sat sketching this sunny scene in West Smithfield in April two years ago.

You can thank the Japanese Ukiyo-e artists Hokusai and Hiroshige for reminding me of the strength of designs in their pictures of cherry trees and that you can have a tree trunk which is barely in the picture plane!

My blog post then The Courtauld, Old Bank of England and West Smithfield tells you about the very considerable history behind this place and its connections with both Wat Tayler and William Wallace.

Cherry blossom in West Smithfield

London spring street and park reportage

All of them are very quick, done almost on the run.

Shoreditch E1 - near the art shop:


Regents Park:


Covent garden crowd on Sunday:

London spring street and park reportage

The Trafalgar Square Olympic Clock

The Sketch of The Trafalgar Square Olympic Clock


Yesterday I went to Mall Galleries for the ROI Annual General Meeting and also used the opportunity to view the Lynn Stainer Painters Exhibition. While on my way back to Charing Cross Station I decided to stop and sketch the Official Countdown Timer for The Olympics at Trafalgar Square.



Sketching in progress


I sketched it while it was 116 days to go, I hope to sketch it again when it's only a day or 2 to go, if I am chanced. I sketched this in my A4 Moleskin Sketchbook with a 2B Chunky graphite stick, a 2H pencil and a 0.7 mechanical clutch pencil.



Snap shot of the Scene


For more of my sketches, you can visit my blog

The Trafalgar Square Olympic Clock

The River Thames at Kew in March

Earlier this month - in the first spell of good weather - we went down to Kew Gardens twice in one week.  We also left the gardens via the Brentford Gate and walked on the towpath next to the River Thames wile the tide was out.

I sketched this view sat nearly opposite Syon House.  I started it on the Monday and finished it on the Thursday.  It has the soft hazy colours of a warm day which started with fog!

The Thames at Kew - looking towards Richmond 12 and 15 March 2012
pen and ink and coloured pencils in Moleskine sketchbook, 11" x 16"
© Katherine Tyrrell - all rights reserved

You can read more about the place and my visit here on my sketchbook blog - The Thames at Kew - in March sunshine

The River Thames at Kew in March

Still standing: Big Ben

James Hobbs, Clock Tower, Westminster

Big Ben is leaning, it has been announced by surveyors, although at 0.26 degrees (about 8.5 inches at the height of the clock) it will take, they somehow estimate, about 10,000 years to reach the same angle as the tower at Pisa, which is standing at around four degrees.

Despite the tower’s minor tilt, it is apparent to the naked eye. From across Westminster Bridge it leans slightly to the right. For the sake of political balance, from Parliament Square it leans slightly to the left. (There’s no comfortable Liberal Democrat viewpoint, but it seems few want to view anything from that angle anyway.)

The tower’s gradually shift, hardly helped by having the Jubilee tube line running beneath it, isn’t being treated as an emergency. Renovation work isn’t expected to start before 2020. If you’re coming to London for the Olympics, it should still be standing.

More at www.james-hobbs.blogspot.com.

Still standing: Big Ben

Meet the correspondents: Zhenia Vasiliev

For me, both a graphic designer and illustrator, drawing is rather a process of thinking rather producing a finished piece. I love to think about how things look like, and drawing helps me with this, so sketching is a big part of my profession.

Regrettably, my full-time work schedule does not allow me to do full-scale sketching sessions too often, so most of the time I do a sketch on the go, whenever I am - so any place around London will suit me as a sketcher. I love working on along Regents canal, sketching birds, trees and people in the parks, or make a quick street scene from a cafe window, especially when it's cold outside.

I love trying all of the art materials and exploring how different materials work together in a sketch. When I go out of the house, I just grab something that lies on my work table - a bunch of colour pencils, a waterbrush, a watercolour box or just a ballpoint pen. All the materials are worth exploring and give a new dimension to my work.

Visit my blog and check out my flickr.

Marble Arch, waterbrush, india ink

Traffic jam, colour pencils, from an upper deck of a double decker bus.

Upper street sketch, North London, watercolour

Meet the correspondents: Zhenia Vasiliev

Tower Bridge Nocturne and Sketches on the train

Tower Bridge at night always has a romantic feel for me, my wife and I frequented the place while courting and it always brings back pleasant memories. This sketch was completed all on site with watercolour, gouache, Tom Bow Wash pens, coloured pencils and a Black Bic ball point pen.




I also traveled to London Bridge on Southeastern trains and did 2 pages of sketches of commuters. I particularly enjoyed sketching the guy with the hat on the left, the lighting in the train helped to "sculpt" his features a bit more clearly.




The next set of sketches are all unfinished because the commuters all got off before I could complete a single face, but I like the feeling of having several unfinished faces on one page spread.

Tower Bridge Nocturne and Sketches on the train