Tra Que Herb Village
Posted: April 28, 2026 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Hoi An, travel sketching, urban sketch, Vietnam, watercolour sketch 7 CommentsOne of the things I loved best about the food in Hoi An was that with almost any dish that you ordered, there was an accompanying plate of fresh herbs that you could add to soups and noodles or roll into Bánh xèo. The herbs often included basil, mint and coriander, but on the plate there were also greens that I had never seen and that made every dish so tasty.
One of our first bus outings was to Tra Que Herb Village. I was really looking forward to learning more about (and drawing!) the mysterious and delicious herbs. From our shaded spot we looked out into the gardens to draw the fields, the farmers and the surrounding houses. I hope I conveyed the steamy heat that we felt as we drew.
I asked for and was really hoping that someone would give us a tour of the garden or pick a selection of herbs that we could draw for our sketchbook pages, but that didn’t work out as expected. Later in the week I filled the space on that spread with a sketch (using Inktense pencils) of a utility pole that echoed the poles in the field. It’s not the herbs I was hoping for but those poles and wires are so much fun to draw!
Inside outside
Posted: April 24, 2026 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Hoi An, travel sketching, urban sketch, Vietnam, watercolour sketch 11 CommentsWe arrived in Vietnam late at night, so it wasn’t until the next day that I could really see what Hoi An looked like. When I threw open the blackout curtains on our first morning I saw two things. The first view of the manicured hotel grounds was directly below our balcony: a turquoise swimming pool surrounded by lounge chairs, lush greenery, silk lanterns and a poolside bar. The second view — beyond the hotel — was the Vietnam that I had been looking forward to seeing (and sketching): a bustling street with noisy scooters flying by, an outdoor restaurant with tiny red stools, construction workers wearing Nón Lá (the conical Vietnamese bamboo hats), all of it lit by a hazy orange sun coming up in the sky. In preparation for my first day of teaching, I sat in the shade of our hotel entrance to draw this busy scene.
On the first morning of the tour, my group and I drew this view together. For this one I used ink instead of pencil for the initial drawing, and I also simplified the composition.
Note: I do not recommend the tour company that hosted my group. If you are thinking of going to Vietnam on a sketching trip, please email me privately for more details.
Motif #1 and #2
Posted: July 21, 2025 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: cape ann, motif #1, rockport, travel sketching 18 CommentsGo ahead and type “Motif #1 painting” in your search engine. You’ll find hundreds of paintings and sketches of this iconic red Rockport fishing shack. I’ve painted it many times myself, from different viewpoints. Last week, during my warm-up sketching days before my workshops at Slow River Studio in Topsfield, I sketched it from the left side — an angle that was new to me. I drew first with my Lamy pen that’s filled with water-soluble copper ink and then added some light washes on top. This ink dissolves almost completely into the watercolour but if you’re painting a red building, it sort of works in your favour by melting into the red/brown washes.
Later in the week, it was also the subject of one of my workshop demos, although this time we sketched it from the front. If you are sitting on the end of the town wharf, the morning light on the building is ideal. As for what red to choose for this, I used a combination of Alizarin Crimson and Burnt Sienna, adding a little Violet to the mix for the shadows. The actual paint on the building is a flat reddish brown, more like Indian Red, but I don’t have that on my palette (too opaque!) so this was my solution.
Upper Town Dock
Posted: October 24, 2024 Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: autumn, bar harbor, maine, sketching workshop, travel sketching 9 CommentsUpper Town Dock is my kinda subject. Reflections, pilings, lobster traps, rusty drums and yellow ropes. And only one surly fisherman who thought that the town dock was no place for sketchers. Despite that, this was one of my favourite locations in a fantastic week of teaching on location with Madeline Island School in Bar Harbor, Maine. We were lucky with the autumn weather too — one day of rain followed by four glorious sunny (and cold) days.
It can be chilly in Maine in October, but I appreciate that everyone in my group came prepared with layers of sweaters and jackets, hats and gloves, and also that no one complained about the cold or left early. (Maybe they read my post from September about having to buy a hat and gloves in North Norfolk!)
We talked a lot during the workshop about using limited palettes in watercolour, and that’s mostly what I used here — a blue, a yellow, a bit of burnt sienna, and then just a few dots of red at the end. More Maine sketches coming tomorrow!
