New from Simone and Pete

Two new books have been published in the past few months by artists well known in urban sketching circles, and I have drawings in both of them. Archisketcher by Simone Ridyard and Creative Sketching Workshop by Pete Scully are both published in the UK by Apple. With Katherine Tyrrell's Sketching 365 and my own Sketch Your World, they make up a quartet of drawing books published by Apple that reveal themselves through the similar covers and designs (well done that RotoVision team).

Simone's Archisketcher focuses on the nitty-gritty of urban sketching: architecture. It has drawings by about 40 artists, and I particularly like the way it gets beneath the surface to look at how cities have changed and developed, focuses on different architectural styles, and explores the characters of neighbourhoods well known to particular contributors. It is great to be led through the streets by Simone, who is a Manchester-based architect and senior lecturer — she is playing a central role in the annual Urban Sketchers symposium that heads to that city in July 2016.

Pete Scully is based in Davis, California, but English — we've only met once at a sketchcrawl he organised through the East End. His book, Creative Sketching Workshop, takes the form of a series of workshops by 12 artists who each explore their own approaches to particular themes, such as drawing in bars, making travel portraits or street sketching. Each section starts with a jumping-off point to get you started, followed by a series of examples by the artist. It's a book, like Simone's, that urges us to get out and draw.

They are on sale in the usual places, usually close to Sketch Your World and Sketching 365.

In Pete Scully's new book

I have a couple of chapters in Pete Scully's great new book, Creative Sketching Workshop, which is published now. (The covers, drawn by Pete here, are for the US and UK editions.) I know Pete through the Urban Sketchers network and through joining him on his sketchcrawl around the East End of London a few years ago when he was back visiting the UK (he now lives in Davis, California). And I'm looking forward to seeing him again later in the year.

There are contributions to the book from other artists I've worked with before, including Virginia Hein, Nina Johansson and Melanie Reim. It's great to be in such good company.

Did you spot the family resemblance of his book and Sketch Your World? That's because they are related, along with Simone Ridyard's Archisketcher, just published, and Katherine Tyrrell's Sketching 365, both of which I also have work in. (We are all published in the UK by Apple Press and in the US by North Light.) I'll blog about Simone's book too when I get my hands on a copy.

Here's a page from my parks and gardens chapter in Creative Sketching Workshop, which is available, like the other books, from discerning bookshops and the usual online places.

Sketchcrawling around Spitalfields

Christ Church Spitalfields, London

I met up with Urban Sketchers Pete Scully, Sue Pownall, Dave Black, Olha Pryymak and Evelyn Rowland – and many more – at Pete's sketchcrawl around Whitechapel and Spitalfields this week, some of them fresh from the USk symposium in Barcelona. London is still reeling from having a summer on its hands – a novel concept and the first in living memory for many – meaning that the conditions were in stark contrast to the sketchcrawl last winter at Tate Modern when temperatures were sub-zero and huskies were compulsory. 

Commercial Street, London

Pete's route took in a variety of places related to Jack the Ripper, the serial killer in 1880s London, ending up at the Ten Bells pub in on Commercial Street, where we compared drawings and supped restorative liquids, next to Hawksmoor's fantastic Christ Church Spitalfields. It's a part of town that is culturally rich, creative, graffiti-adorned, historic, poor and beautiful. It isn't perfect, but it's exactly what makes London such a great place. The East End has a lifetime of drawing in it – and that's why it was a great place for Pete to arrange a sketchcrawl.

London sketchcrawl: Saturday 26 May

Defoe Road, Stoke Newington

Urban Sketcher Pete Scully is coming to London this weekend, and he has arranged a sketchcrawl around Fleet Street on Saturday 26 May from 10.30am to 4.30pm.

The starting point is at Temple tube station, but there is more information on the Urban Sketchers London website.

All you need is something to draw on, something to draw with, and a few hours. No charge.