Housing, residential – Jane Sketching

Sainte-Croix houses

In the afternoon I sat down on the stone steps and sketched the houses that were in front of me.

I was struck by how the afternoon sun cast shadows on that glass screen, centre left, and illuminated the little greenhouse-type roof on the house in the centre. These are solid Swiss houses, with heavy tiled roofs and properly operational shutters. Some of the metalwork, such as the guttering and the surroundings of the chimney stacks, is in actual copper. Even the downpipes are copper.

One tree was a fir tree and was opaque. The other tree was twigs, and was transparent.

Although it was spring, this is at 1200m, and it was cold. The deciduous trees are still bare. The hill is the background is Mont-de-Baulmes. Many of the trees up there are deciduous larch.

I painted this picture in watercolour-only. Usually I use pen. Here, I did a quick pencil sketch and then straight on with the colour. It was too cold to try to get any details or do any penmanship. The solid plainness of the houses seemed to demand flat colour washes. I deliberately left lines of white between the slabs of colour – the sun always catches edges.

“The House they Left Behind” London E14

I read an article in “A London Inheritance” about this house, and went off on an expedition to find it.

“The House they left Behind”, 27 Ropemakers Fields, London E14 8BX, sketched in Sketchbook 14 28th Jan 2024 at 2pm

The London Inheritance article shows a 1986 photo taken by the author’s father. Painted on the side of the building was the sign:

THE HOUSE THEY LEFT BEHIND
BUILT 1857
RESTORED 1985

The sign has now been painted over. The wall, which is on the left of my drawing, is now completely white. But the name lives on and appears on current maps. Here is a map showing where the house is.

The building is now residential, but was previously a pub. It was “left behind” by the bombs dropped on London by the Luftwaffe in the 1939-45 conflict. The website “Layers of London” provides maps of bomb damage in London. Here is the area.

Map showing bomb damage. Classified from Total Destruction (Black), through Seriously Damaged (Dark Red) to Clearance Areas (Green).
credit:
https://www.layersoflondon.org/map/overlays/bomb-damage-1945
Map provided by London Metropolitan Archives. Geo-referenced with the support of the National Library of Scotland

The map is based on 1:2500 Ordnance Survey sheets originally published in 1916. The bomb damage was recorded on these maps by hand soon after it happened. The circle represents where a V2 rocket landed. The red area shows buildings that were classified as “seriously damaged – doubtful if repairable”. As you see, the pub, labelled “P.H.”and outlined in red, is shown as undamaged.

I found more information on Bomb Damage Maps from a National Geographic article on a book about the maps. This article also provides a detailed key to the colours on the map. The book is “The London County Council Bomb Damage Maps” by Laurence Ward.

“A diary entry included in the book, from architect Andrew Butler on April 20, 1941, gives an idea of what the work was like:

For the block I have started on—eight floors high with two flats on each floor—has had its whole face ripped off … I found it possible to stand on part of the roof. So, clutching a broken chimney, I surveyed the damage there. My notebook became very messy. What with the dust and soot, wet filth and the perspiration of fluster on my hands, it was difficult to read what I wrote. The notes served their purpose however when, after drying the book, I had to transcribe them into a report.”
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/bomb-damage-maps-reveal-londons-world-war-ii-devastation

The original maps are in the London Metropolitan Archives.

Here is my work in progress on the sketch. Thank you to the author of “A London Inheritance” for providing the stimulus for this expedition. Thank you also to the friends and family of local resident David Newell-Smith, on whose memorial bench I completed the sketch. His dates are given as 1937-2017. He would have been a boy when the bombs were falling.

Canal Building, 135/7 Shepherdess Walk, N1

Here is The Canal Building, at the north end of Shepherdess Walk, sketched yesterday from the junction with Eagle Wharf Road.

Canal Building, Shepherdess Walk, London N1, sketched 29 December 2023 in Sketchbook 14

The building overhanging, in the top right of the drawing is part of Angel Wharf, 164 Shepherdess Walk. Shepherdess Walk leads over the Regents Canal, the bridge is just behind the cars in the picture. The buildings you see above the cars are on the other sidee of the canal. On the left is the “Wenlock Brewery”.

There is a tiny object on the roof of the Canal Building, next to the flagpole. It was hard to see what it was, but it looked like a wooden owl.

The Canal Building is a former 1930s Art Deco warehouse. In 2000, it was converted into apartments and commercial space to the design of the architects Child Graddon Lewis. This building gained the architects a place amongst the finalists for the 2023 Architecture Today Awards, in the category “Mixed Use and Retail”. There are 35 new apartments, 45 live/work units and 1100 sq metres of commercial space. Here are photos of the building from the canal side.

I did the pen on location and added the colour at my desk later. It was cold outside and I was sitting on a damp stone wall. Many people were out and about in the area, and two of them stopped to say hello and look at the drawing.

There are just three main colours in the sketch: Buff Titanium, Burnt Umber and Ultramarine Blue.

Buff Titanium for the Canal Building
All greys and blacks are Ultramarine Blue plus Burnt Umber
Ultramarine Blue for the blue car, the blue notice, and in the sky
The trees are Burnt Umber
And that’s it! There is a bit of Mars Yellow for the car number plate.

All colours are Daniel Smith except the blue, which is Schminke Horadam.

This is my first sketch in a new sketchbook!

Here are some other sketches I’ve done in Shepherdess Walk:

The Eagle, 2 Shepherdess Walk

Here is The Eagle. This is a very old pub, located at a significant junction on City Road. In the picture above, the alley on the right of the pub is called “Shepherdess Place”. It leads to a police car park, and several…

Plumage House, N1

Here is Plumage House, 106 Shepherdess Walk, London N1. This was a feather factory. According to Spitalfields Life this operated until 1994. The building is now rather shabby, though in a dignified way. I wonder what will happen to it? In the drawing,…

Trellick Tower, London W10

Here is the magnificent Trellick Tower in West London.

Trellick Tower from the Golbourne Road, London W10. Sketched 28 November 2023 in Sketchbook 13

This tower is 271 flats, 31 stories, completed in 1972 to the design of Ernő Goldfinger (note 1). It is in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, near the Grand Union Canal and the A40 trunk road out of London. It is Grade II* listed (note 2)

After sketching, I was really cold. I found warmth and excellent food in the Sicilian Café “Panella” shown on the map above, recommended!

I have previously sketched the Balfron Tower in East London, also designed by Ernő Goldfinger.

Balfron Tower

Note 1: Information on the Balfron Tower and Trellick Tower is from the RIBA website: https://www.architecture.com/explore-architecture/inside-the-riba-collections/trellick-tower-turns-50

Note 2: Grade II* listing: https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1246688?section=official-list-entry

The RIBA site gives the number of flats as 271, the Historic England Site as 217.

21 and 23 Park Street, Borough SE1 “Take Courage”

I enjoy the marvellous trigonometry of this roof, and the encouraging slogan on the wall.

21 and 23 Park Street, Borough, Southwark, London SE1. Sketched 30th August 2023, 2pm.

The slogan is for a brewery, Courage.
This house was built in 1820 for the managers of the Anchor Brewery, then on this site. The Anchor pub is on the river Thames nearby.

Map from “Borough Yards” poster (rotated to put North at the top)

The building, and its cast iron railing, is listed Grade II, number 1385752. When I searched for the list entry in the Historic England register, I found, to my surprise, that the bollards in my picture have their own special listing, number 1385753 “

“5 cast iron Canon posts 1 inscribed “CLINK 1812”
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1385753?section=official-list-entry

So I had to go back and have a closer look at them. Why were they listed? The list entry does not say. There are some bollards in London which are former cannon. It’s always a delight to discover them. They can be positively identified because you can see the indentation or hole near the base, which is where the gunpowder used to be poured in. Also they sometimes have protrusions about two-thirds down where they used to pivot on their gun-carriage. Sometimes the base is flattened on one side. Here are some examples of cannon (click the image to enlarge and see location):

I was unable to find on these 21 Park Street bollards any characteristic which confirmed they might have been cannon. The listing says they are “canon posts” – “canon” spelt like that – not “cannon”. The words “CLINK 1812” were still just about visible on the bollard which is on the right in my drawing. Here are some photos of the posts outside 21 Park Street. Click to enlarge and see captions. Do you think they might be real cannon, or perhaps the word “canon” simply describes a design of post.

“Clink” was the name of the area, from about 1127. It was called the “Liberty of Clink”. The designation “Liberty” implied that it was a civic area under the jurisdiction of the local manor, rather than the King, or the City of London. Famously, certain activities, including theatres, which were forbidden in the City of London were permitted here. The Liberty of Clink was abolished in 1889 and amalgamated into the Southwark in the County of London.

Here are some photos of work in progress on the drawing:

Drawing size 10″ x 8″ on Arches papers 300gsm NOT watercolour paper, in a sketchbook made by Wyvern Bindery.

Watercolours by Daniel Smith:

ultramarine blue
fired gold ochre
green gold
burnt umber
yellow line is naples yellow
All blacks and greys are Ultramarine Blue plus Burnt Umber

A notice on 21 Park Street reads:

The tree closest to this building
 is planted in fond memory of 
Tom Quinlivan 1934-1996 
long time resident of Park Street.

Urban sketching, Shetland and the journey south 2023

Here is a postcard which I made at the end of a long hot walk. It shows the houses in Walls, on Shetland West Side.

Houses by the water, Walls, Shetland. Postcard sketch A5, 8th July 2023

Here is Burrastow House and Burrastow Cottage, an evening view. I sketched this on top of a sky view I’d sketched earlier, but which had been spotted by rain, as you see.

Burrastow House and cottage, evening view. A5 postcard.

This is a restaurant in Lerwick: “C’est la vie”.

“C’est la vie” French restaurant, Lerwick, postcard sketch A5, August 3rd 2023

The flags are to welcome the “Tall Ships” which came to Lerwick earlier in the week. The restaurant was closed, I was waiting to see if it opened. Then the rain started. Then the restaurant opened and I finished the sketch inside. Then I walked to the Ferry Terminal.

On the ferry, I made quick sketch of people at breakfast.

On board MV Hrossey, approaching Aberdeen. Breakfasters in the lounge. August 4th 2023. Vintage paper company sketchbook, A5

Here is my final sketch of the expedition. On the train at Aberdeen, I looked out of the window.

Sketch: from the train, Aberdeen, Aug 4th 2023

I have a sketchbook full of images. Here’s a quick flip through showing random glimpses of the visit: (19 second silent video)

Roofscape from Macklin Street, London WC2

Walking through the back streets of Covent Garden, I came across a row of Victorian brick-built houses. This is Macklin Street. I made a quick sketch of the roofs.

Roofscape from Macklin Street, 5th June 2023 in Sketchbook 13

While sketching I noticed a peculiar thing. There are no doors onto the street. It turns out the entrance to this row of buildings is on the nearby Newton Street, overhung by greenery and climbing plants.

The brick building in my sketch is Wimbledon Buildings, formerly Wimbledon House, built in 1893.

In 1893 the Parker Street Lodging House was
completed for 345 people. In 1896 Aldwych, Cotterell
and Lindsey (demolished in the 1960s), Powis and
Wimbledon buildings were completed for 284 people.
Twenty workshops were also provided. The scheme also
widened Parker Street and Macklin Street.
page 9, Camden Conservation Area Statement (undated) [https://www.camden.gov.uk/documents/20142/7905860/Seven+Dials+Estate+CAS.pdf]

It is now part of a “Central London residential street with a community of social housing and owner occupying flats”, with its own Twitter account. Here is a interesting picture from that Twitter feed, showing the roof gable I sketched. This is the view from Newton Street, with Macklin Street going off to the right. Note the absence of front doors. The entrances are through a gate at the left of the photo.

St Joseph’s Primary School is on Macklin Street. Its former name, Macklin Street Catholic School, is still clearly inscribed in the stonework high up. As I sketched, the children came out into the street at the end of their school day.

The Camden Conservation Area statement mentioned above is on this link . If that doesn’t work, you can download it from the link below. It is 36 pages.

seven-dials-estate-cas Download

A House in East London

Here is a Victorian terraced house in East London.

This was a commissioned drawing. Thank you to my client for the commission and for their permission to post the picture here.

There were two interesting challenges in this drawing. One was the fact that the front of the house was obscured by parked cars. The other was the characteristic colour of the brickwork: a clean and lively yellow. I wanted to draw the fence without the cars, so as to show the whole house. And I wanted to get that yellow right.

I was stationed on the other side of the road. There were cars parked nose-to-tail on both sides of the road. To draw the part behind the parked cars, I crossed the road and had a look then come back and sketched and then wandered about sketching and trying to get it right, gradually becoming skilled at envisaging the fence behind the car. Fortunately it was a quiet road. The few passers-by took a friendly interest, bemused by an itinerant artist in their street.

To match the colour of the brickwork, I equipped myself with a colour chart of all the yellows I possess. Usually, old London brickwork is Mars Yellow. But in this case I discovered that it was Naples Yellow, a cleaner, paler colour, less orange than Mars Yellow, more orange than Nickel Titanate Yellow. Naples Yellow also has a pleasant chalky texture, which made it perfect for this brickwork .

Most of this picture was painted in 3 basic colours: Ultramarine Blue, Naples Yellow and Burnt Umber. Here are the detailed colours, all Daniel Smith:

Sky: Mostly Ultramarine Blue, plus some Lavender and Cobalt Teal Blue
Brickwork: Mostly Naples Yellow plus a bit of Mars Yellow in the darker places
Window surrounds and plasterwork: Buff Titanium (very dilute)
Green door: Serpentine Genuine
Terracotta chimney pots: Fired Gold Ochre
All greys and shadows: a mix of Burnt Umber and Ultramarine Blue.

The paper is Arches Aquarelle 300gsm Cold Pressed in a block. The ink is De Atramentis Document Black, applied with a fountain pen.

I did a preliminary sketch to understand the perspective and the proportions. Here are some images of work in progress. This was January and very cold. I managed to complete the pen and ink on location and then added the colour at my desk in the warm when I returned home.

Great Arthur House, Golden Lane Estate, EC1

Here is a view of Great Arthur House from Crescent House, on the Golden Lane Estate, London EC1.

Great Arthur House from Crescent House, sketched 6th Dec 2022 in sketchbook 12

Here are the names of the blocks you can see:

The round objects in the foreground are ventilator shafts for the car park below. You can also see the route underneath Great Arthur House.

I’ve sketched in the Golden Lane Estate before: see this link for more drawings.

Here is work in progress and a map.

Marine Court, St Leonards, East Sussex, TN38

Here is the magnificent Marine Court, a residential building on the coast at St Leonards in Sussex. It was built in the 1930s, although it looks later. It was hugely controversial at the time, as you can imagine. The design emulates that of an ocean liner, the Queen Mary. Wikipedia tells me that the building originally had a rooftop bar, which must have been fun.

Marine Court, St Leonards, in sketchbook 12

I was particularly taken by the design right at the top. From this angle, it looks like waves. This building is on the sea front, the sea is behind me and to the left.

The top of the building looks like waves. I had to number the floors to keep track of where I was…!

It is an Art Deco building, constructed between 1936 and 1938. It was requisitioned for military use in the 1939-45 conflict, and bombed in September 1942. The bomb damage was repaired after the war. It was listed Grade II in 1999.

The original concept was upmarket serviced apartments:

Design for total living environment
Marine Court was designed to provide “an environment for total living” – a self-contained lifestyle within the complex, but not necessarily within each apartment. Modest sized flats originally had tiny kitchens – it was assumed that most of the inhabitants would dine in the main restaurant at the eastern end of the building, or avail themselves of room service.
There were shops, parking, roof sun decks and recreational facilities (including a dance floor and bar) – and in-house staff to do the chores (there are still some call buttons to summons the now-defunct service).
Hastings Borough Council Marine Court, St Leonards-on-Sea Conservation, Management Plan [1]

It was privately developed. But the construction costs went over budget and sales of flats were slow. The owners, South Coast (Hastings and St. Leonards) Properties Company, went bust. After being occupied by the military, the building passed into the hands of Hastings Borough Council. By 2007, the building was becoming old, and evidently the repairs programme was not coping with the deterioration of the building. Hastings Borough Council proposed an plan [1]. This lists the problems in some detail, including such serious items as:

Condition of building service equipment
The condition of building services and utility equipment [gas boilers / water / electricity / air /lifts / other] are the cause of some shared concern amongst the building’s managing agents and the residential leaseholders
Hastings Borough Council Marine Court, St Leonards-on-Sea Conservation, Management Plan [1]

Evidently this plan by Hastings Borough Council did not work out well, because by 2010 the leaseholders had acquired the freehold and formed their own company: “Marine Court (St Leonards On Sea) Freeholders Limited”.

The flats look beautiful inside, as you can see for example in this listing from “The Modern House” estate agent: https://www.themodernhouse.com/past-sales/marine-court-vi/

The “Hastings Independent” reported on January 25th 2019: “The Grade II listing in 1999 made the costs of upkeep that much higher. However, the freehold was bought by the residents through a company, Marine Court (St Leonards on Sea) Freeholders Limited in 2010, and the prestige of the address, not to mention the glorious sea views from its upper windows, has ensured that most of the flat owners have been affluent enough, or can charge sufficient rent to sub-tenants, to meet the restoration bills as they are incurred.” The article goes on to describe problems in letting the retail shops which are underneath the canopy. They say: “Current controversies centre on the cost of works to upgrade a series of shared toilets at the rear of the premises with enhanced fire precaution measures including smoke alarms. The shops, which don’t need to provide toilet facilities for their customers, make sparing use of them; on the other hand, they are essential to the bars and restaurants, which do. Either way the projected cost of almost £100,000, charged in advance on the basis of estimates, is widely regarded as completely out of proportion to what is necessary or reasonable. …Some [business owners] are said to be taking legal advice on how to challenge the extent of the charges being levied. Others have simply left. There are several shopfronts now boarded up, which is having an adverse effect not just on general morale, but on the footfall which most of those who remain depend upon. “

That was in 2019. When I walked past in 2022, the majority of the shopfronts were boarded up, which is a great pity, as it is a good location, and shielded from the sun and wind.