Well, this week was the first in my Sketching Architecture course of 4 weeks, based in the Rocks, Sydney. I am running the class on a Thursday and a Friday morning. It was really fun to do the same class back to back like this and I am especially excited about the opportunity to put together 4 consecutive lessons – each building on the previous.

  
Each week we start inside doing some ‘theory’ and paper exercises and I am very happy to be using the upstairs room of the wonderful Tea Cosy tearoom as our classroom. It is very strange to be in there and NOT to draw my cup of tea, cosied pot and scones… but we have architecture on our minds!

This first week I laid the foundation. Just for the record, I only mentioned perspective in passing… I also was not concerned about perfect proportion either  – both of these will be addressed in future classes! Instead we looked at a way to see buildings forms better  in order to give us confidence to have a go at a complicated building – starting with the big picture (the main volumes) and not allowing ourselves to get sidetracked by the details.

In the classroom we drew Notre Dame in 5 minutes –  ok it was more like 10 minutes and I think everyone found this fun …it certainly was very achievable!

What was a little more daunting was the building I choose for them to draw once we got out on location… one of the most complicated buildings in the Rocks!? The Australasian Steam Navigation Building located on the corner of Hickson Road and George Street.  Warehouse and office building  designed by William Wardell in the Federation Anglo-Dutch style and completed in 1884.

Starting with the overall forms, everyone was able to produce a sketch that really captures the essence of the building and we shared lots of tricky bits along the way. The use of  coloured pencil setups is a ‘week 1 specialty’ that enables us all to see the process that everyone went through while they were sketching. Both groups did amazing jobs and as usual, I love the way we all learn so much from each other!

Next week we will become more accurate …but still have a lot of fun!