Next Sketch Outing
Sunday, Sep 21: Ballard Old Town
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| 7/17/15 Occidental Square |
When I sketched the 200 Occidental construction site a couple of months ago, it was more colorful – two cranes and a concrete pumper. Today only a concrete pumper was visible, but it was much noisier – I was happy to have earplugs, which have long become a permanent part of my sketch kit, given my penchant for sketching construction sites.
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| 7/17/15 200 Occidental construction site |
Wanting to give my ears a break, I went around the corner to Occidental Square, the primary site of the Friday sketchers’ outing. I settled in to sketch the two large totems in the center of the park surrounded by trees (Frank is sitting against one of them at far left). Tubaluba, the featured Out to Lunch concert series group, started tuning up and testing mics for their noontime performance, and I happened to be sitting directly in front of the stage speakers. I actually like the kind of jazz they play, but not at that volume – again, my ear plugs came in handy!
To fill the last few minutes before our sketchbook sharing, I sketched a girl and her dad playing chess on the park’s giant chessboard. By that time, Tubaluba had started the concert, and once again, I was relieved that my ears were still plugged.
Interestingly, during each sketch, at least one passer-by stopped to watch and express curiosity and interest in my sketching. Shouting through our conversations to be heard through the noise and music, it was a loud morning, to say the least.
Whoever said sketching was a quiet hobby?
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| 7/17/15 chess game at Occidental Square |
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| 5/8/15 An old saddlery sign's bronze horse at Second and Jackson. |
Although the Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park (actually a small museum) was the main destination for the Friday sketchers, the “good weather contingency plan” was anywhere in Pioneer Square. I decided the day was too sunny to sketch indoors!
While waiting for others to arrive just outside the Klondike museum, I sketched the three-dimensional horse sculpture that used to be the sign for a saddlery back when there were as many horses as vehicles going through Pioneer Square. The building owner had the good sense to save the horse, which now stands over the 88 Keys Dueling Piano Sports Bar.
With my warm-up done, I moved on to my objective for the day: The construction site for 200 Occidental, destined to be “155,000 square feet of office space, underground parking for 68 cars and 15,000 square feet of retail” next to Occidental Square. OK, OK, I know progress marches on, but I’m saddened that this view of the Smith Tower, one of my favorite Seattle buildings, will soon be blocked. Someday I’ll come back and sketch the “after” view.
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| 5/8/15 200 Occidental construction site |
A short distance away is Waterfall Garden Park, a little gem of an urban park that you could easily miss walking by if it weren’t for the sound of rushing water from the 22-foot waterfall. I used to eat my brown bag lunches there during the summer when I worked downtown a long time ago, but I hadn’t been there in years. Wouldn’t you know it – the same construction cranes from 200 Occidental were visible behind the waterfall.
After the meetup to share sketches and after lunch with Kate, I still hadn’t gotten enough sketching on this gorgeous day (70 degrees by then!). I went back to Occidental Park to sketch the Fallen Firefighters Memorial made up of four life-size bronze figures (the dude at left is not made of bronze). Erected in 1998 for the four firefighters who died in an International District warehouse in 1995, the memorial honors all Seattle firefighters who have died in the line of duty. And ha! – there are those same cranes again! (Even when I’m not sketching them, I’m sketching them.)
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| 5/8/15 Waterfall Garden Park |
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5/8/15 Fallen Firefighters Memorial
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