Tag / cafe sketches

by Leonie Andrews

Back to the cafe

Back sketching at our favourite coffee shop this morning.

So good to get back to our favourite cafe.

I spent some time thinking about what I wanted to sketch, which was one of the key points in the workshop I did with Richard Briggs last week.

Trying to leave out unnecessary details.

I was interested in the relationship between the hedge across the road and the small hedge close to me. But then I realised that I really wanted the focus to be on the cluster of small stools in front of the hedge.

A small table and stools.

While completing this sketch it dawned on me that the shadows of the stools were also fascinating. One set was being cast by the sun and the ones you see in the painting were cast from the light reflected from the plate glass windows of the cafe. Sadly time and a lack of paper meant that I didn’t make a third sketch, but perhaps I can work on that next time.

by Leonie Andrews

At the cafe today

What used to be Cafe Wednesday has, with a slight drifting of routines, now become Cafe Friday. At present I am carrying a small booklet made from an A3 page of Fabriano watercolour paper, which I stitch together and fold into an old bank bookholder (those were the days!). In the holder I also carry some home made paint dot cards and the obligatory coffee loyalty card.

I made two sketches today to fill up this current booklet, which also includes several pages from my recent trip to Taiwan (more of that later).

A Strawberry Lamington at the Palace Museum in Taipei.

Sketching and drinking coffee at Fu Coffee in Taipei.

Drinking iced coffee and scoffing marscapone and raisin icecream at The Fourth Credit Corporation in Taichung (a very hip repurposed bank building).