A few days in Chicago

Escaped to the windy city of Chicago for a long weekend in early October and it was a perfect opportunity to get in some urban sketching.  Not only was the Lakeshore area great for sketching but the Lincoln Park neighborhood where we stayed had some wonderful brownstone homes and apartments.  We also spent several hours at The Field Museum and the Chinese Terracotta Warrior exhibit.

 Lincoln Park 

Navy Pier

Lincoln Park 

Terracotta Warriors 

Lakeshore trail

Pittock Mansion

Deb planted herself on the east lawn, to sit in the sun and do the mansion.  I found a bench in the sun a little ways off, and settled in to do the same view.  But with Deb stuck in front of it.


I had been comfortable in the sun, but after about an hour I got chilled.  And looking around, found that the shade of a nearby tree had crept around and enveloped me.  It was time to wrap it up, anyway.

Around noon Deb and I both left, leaving Rita halfway through a panorama of the view of the city.  I headed down into Hillside, but stopped for one more when I found that the mountains, even Rainier, were out.

Impromptu Sketch Session at the Pittock Mansion

When the rainy October unexpectedly gifts you a crisp sunny day it is time to summon the fellow Portland sketchers and head somewhere with a view. Fortunately, the Pittock Mansion never disappoints.

November 12 Sketch Crawl, the Foundry

Saturday, November 12, Inner SE Portland

Gregg has set it up for us to sketch at a building that used to be a foundry.  There should be lots of interesting interior elements to sketch in there.  The industrial neighborhood around it abounds with fun drawing too.

10:00am -  Meet at Good Coffee, 1150 SE 12th Ave, for snacks, coffee, and introductions.

10:30am - Walk over to 831 SE Salmon to sketch the old foundry building.

12:30pm - OPTIONAL- Meet at Green Dragon Bistro & Pub, 928 SE 9th Ave, for lunch and sketchbook sharing.

Looking forward to seeing you there!

The Cancelled Ladd's Addition Sketchcrawl

Here's part of the group that showed up for the Ladd's Addition Sketchcrawl this weekend.  It was warm and cozy inside Palio and all of us stayed inside except Deb, who was undaunted by the rain.

Palio now has stained glass hanging over some of the picture windows so it's trickier to get an outside view.

Still, we had some available models right before us...

The power stayed on, the coffee was good and the sketching and conversation ebbed and flowed--all in all, another successful sketching morning. 

Reminder - October 15 Sketch Crawl, Ladd's Addition!

Looks like tomorrow (Saturday) will be stormy so I'm sure many of us will stay inside at Palio. For the intrepid among you, bring your rain gear and waterproof sketching materials!

Saturday, October 15, 2016.
Hopefully we will have some nice fall colors over in Ladd's Addition by the time we meet next month.

10:00am:  Meet at Palio Dessert and Espresso House, 1996 SE Ladd Ave Portland, OR 97214, for coffee, snacks, and introductions.

10:30am: Sketch Ladd's Addition trees, houses, roses (if there are any left).

12:00noon:  OPTIONAL - Meet at the food cart pod at 12th and Hawthorne for lunch & and sketchbook sharing.  If it's raining we may change the lunch location.

Seattle

Starting out with a sketchcrawl at the Olympic Sculpture Park. The Seattle urban sketchers had scheduled this session especially to join up with students from WSU. Only none of them showed up. And only a couple of urban sketchers. The rain held off for the morning, but a vicious wind came up in its place.  Those of us sketching on paper had problems with it trying to blow away.  And even I had to find spots that were sheltered from the wind.  Like the patio behind pavillion.

And then, the sound, from the ped bridge crossing the RR tracks.

Then in Seattle Center (where I'd ended up just so I could use a restroom),  I did a quicky for the few minutes that the monorail stopped in that station.

From there I walked downtown, ending up at the central library.  I rode up the escalator to the reading room at the very top, straight into a clump of sketchers.

Art students, or maybe architecture students.  Maybe even the WSU students that didn't show at the sculpture park this morning.  But they were much more skilled than me. The best I could do inside the library was a tiny bit of the grid work, with normal rectangular buildings outside.