Saturday was the 20th "Worldwide Sketchcrawl", but it was not the greatest day for outdoor sketching. My sister Joan and I started out at a local park where I knew we could sketch from a gazebo and from an indoor observatory. Unfortunately, the building was closed, but we did manage a sketch of the pond from the gazebo. It was only drizzling at this point. Since we couldn't get into the building, we drove off to the site of a historic building called the Hermitage in HoHoKus. It's an old "gingerbread" type house with lots of additions - all sorts of roofs, chimneys, and windows - perfect for someone like me who has trouble with perspective. :-) We found a parking spot with a good view of the side of the building - no parking at the front. It was raining harder by now, but we were all warm and cozy in the car. I actually enjoyed sketching all the nooks and crannies of the building. Then we moved on to a local plant nursery where they had pumpkins on display. By now it was POURING! We were right in front of several pumpkin displays but could only see them for a few minutes at a time, before the windshield was so covered with rain that the pumpkins were a big blur. Whenever Joan saw me squinting, she would put the wipers on for a few seconds to clear things up. After that, we attempted to sketch at Barnes and Noble, but it was very crowded - all the tables at the cafe and all the seats in the reading area were taken, and the occupants didn't look like they were leaving any time this century, so we decided to call it a day and went home with only three sketches. All in all, I think we did pretty well considering.
7 comments:
THese are lovely drawings!! Soo pretty!
These are much better than I can do in clear weather! I think you did amazingly well considering all you had to contend with weather-wise. Sounds like a fun day.
How fun to see the Hermitage! I grew up in Ho-Ho-Kus and now live far away in Minnesota. Thanks to a Google Alert on "Ho-Ho-Kus" I got to see your very pretty work of "our" historic building!
Mickey - The weather wasn't great but I enjoyed our sketchcrawling anyway. I really like all the details you were able to do on the sketch of the Hermitage. I still haven't posted my work from that day on my website. Get ready for the next one. It should be snowing by then!
Thanks, Alina and Susan.
Mandelion, glad my sketches brought a little bit of NJ back to you.
Joan - yes, January, snow, brrrr.... but I'm looking forward to it.
Sounds like you had some challenges for the crawl--but it didn't stop you from making some wonderful art! I like seeing the Hermitage--I spent two years in NJ many years ago and recall how they decorated the place for Christmas. So pretty!
Thanks for looking and commenting, Lisa. I enjoyed sketching at the Hermitage, something that I always planned to do but hadn't gotten around to it. It's about a mile from my house, so I will be sure to do it again from time to time. Every year the Hermitage puts on a Christmas craft show, and each room is decorated with Christmas trees and tables filled with wonderful handmade art. I'm glad that my sketch brought back memories for you.
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