Winter Sketchcrawl SFO

The mild winter here allows location sketching through the winter months. Sometimes it's too cold or windy/rainy to draw outside but most weekends are bright enough. Here's a collection of sketches from the past few months made on drawing trips with sketch-buddies.

The DogPatch is a gentrifying neighbourhood close to the San Francisco docks. Lots of shuttered warehouses, cranes and tankers to draw.

These old cranes are DogPatch landmarks-within the two months I drew them you can see graffiti artists have scaled them and changed the decor.

Nearby is a pleasant water-side pub called The Ramp, its garden a perfect spot for lunch outside while drawing the boats . . . 

This old house seemed to be dipping its toe in the water while the lurching little boat was escaping the freezing Bay waters!

Onto the Mission District . . .

The defunct movie theatres along Mission are great subjects to draw

The back alleys of the Mission offer interesting scenes of crazy wiring, graffiti covered walls, textures and hanging shoe displays.

There are a couple of bar/cafes in the Mission where you can sit outside and draw the locals in safety. A friendly rastafarian shared some tasty cookies he had baked that morning and curiously my sketches came out in Technicolour!

See Stef's sketches on his blog Stef's Sketches!

Crookie's Missionary Position