Sketched May 7, 2012

I rarely make trees the focus of my drawings, but the centenarian Japanese maple in front of Seattle City Hall is not your average specimen. Think of it as a fine piece of public art.

The unusual tree, bigger and older than any other red-lace leaf maple you'd see around here, was brought to Seattle in the late 1990s by local landscape contractor David Ohashi. He found it in Portland and used a semitrailer escorted by pilot cars to get the oversized load up Interstate 5.

The tree drew oohs and aahs at a garden show and eventually caught the eye of then-mayor Paul Schell, who bought it for $35,000 and later raised private contributions to pay back the city.

Since it was installed at the new City Hall in 2003, Schell's maple puts on a colorful show throughout the seasons, attracting downtown workers -- and even this sketcher who doesn't really like to draw trees.

What has drawn your attention around Seattle lately? Send me your suggestions of interesting places and people to sketch via e-mail, Facebook or Twitter. Have a great weekend!

Sketched April 24, 2012

Bubble ... what?

The 1962 World's Fair Bubbleator was an ultramodern, transparent, spheric lift that took 100 people at a time to the "World of Tomorrow," an exhibit of futuristic images inside what is now KeyArena.

It left a lasting impression on visitors, and remained a city attraction through the 1970s, when it was part of the Center House, then known as the Food Circus.

But in the '80s, the Bubbleator's magic popped. Des Moines resident Gene Achziger found it in a heap inside a north Lake Union warehouse where it had been put in storage. It was owned by Seattle Children's hospital, but "they didn't know what to do with it," said Achziger, who paid $1,000 for the pieces to build a greenhouse for his home.

We can still travel on the Monorail and take in the views from the Space Needle. Wouldn't it be cool to ride the Bubbleator again?

Achziger, 58, said some parts are missing but it would still be great if somebody was willing to bring the space elevator back to life. He actually never got to ride it as a boy because of the long lines at the fair.

What has drawn your attention around Seattle lately? Send me your suggestions of interesting places and people to sketch via e-mail, Facebook or Twitter. Have a great weekend!

Sketcher looks back at the Fair: They keep the old Monorail running

More World's Fair Anniversary coverage: seattletimes.com/worldsfair

Remember my sketch of the big "W" sign at the UW? ("Quiet retreat on UW campus," April 20, 2012)

A reader commented that "to install it, they tore down a beautiful 1920s gothic stone gate."

I found that hard to believe. I know there are two gothic-style columns on each side of the entrance, but was a 1920s gate really torn down to make room for this big capital letter?

Not at all.

Kristine Kenney, director of campus design and planning, said the "W" replaced a small slab of concrete inscribed with the words "University of Washington."

That sign was out-of-scale for the Memorial Way entrance and often obscured by plants, said Kenney, who has another location in mind for it: the campus entrance at Northeast 43th Street and 15th Avenue.

The metal "W" that I sketched was installed in the fall of 2010 when the university started rolling out its new brand.

Michael Courtney, the local designer who came up with the idea of the giant letter, sent me the sketch of his original concept after seeing my own sketch. He drew it during a meeting with UW representatives and said the actual sketch helped them sell the idea and eventually find donors to build the sign.

Courtney also said UW President Mark Emmert wanted a sign where people would stop to have their photos taken, something emblematic.

I saw some people take photos of it while I was drawing it, so I think the sign is accomplishing its intended purpose.

It also makes a good sketch subject. Have you ever thought of drawing it?

If you do, send me your sketch and I'll share it on my Facebook page.

"W" sketch courtesy of Michael Courtney Design.

Sketched April 17, 2012

When spring-cleaning season comes around, I'm always faced with the same question: Has the day of reckoning arrived for my 12-year-old iMac?

I'm such a geek that I may never get rid of the bulky computer, but if I do, I think I'll take it to a place like Interconnection.

At the nonprofit computer refurbisher in Fremont, reuse is the goal. Volunteers like Andrew Phetsomphou pry open donated computers and install new parts that give the machines a longer life. The refurbished desktops and laptops then are sold cheap at Interconnection's retail store or shipped internationally to communities with fewer resources. I sketched a pallet of Dells marked for Ghana next to another slated for Mali.

Phetsomphou, a 21-year-old networking student at Highland Community College, is glad to donate time for this cause and calls the hands-on experience "a good résumé builder."

For more information, visit interconnection.org.

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Charles Brennick started Interconnection out of his house in 1999 to help other nonprofits with their computer technology needs. At first, that meant creating websites, but since 2005, his main focus has been the responsible disposal and reuse of computer equipment.

Brennick, a 42-year-old father of two who grew up in Lake Stevens, said there's a lot of fashion in technology. We may think our 5-year-old computer is useless compared to the latest models, but with some upgrades it can still be useful to many people who don't need the latest gizmos, he explained. Or, in other words, "you don't need a Ferrari when you are just driving to school."

Brennick gave me a tour of the 10,000-square-foot warehouse on Stone Way North where Interconnection moved a year ago.

Donated computers fill carts near a loading dock where people drive up to drop off their equipment. Volunteer Daniel Simandjuntak was scanning desktop towers and lining them on a "data-wiping" shelf, where the hard drives are erased.

Next, the machines are moved to a triage area where volunteers clean them up and assess what parts can be reused or need to be recycled. In the sketch you can see a volunteer checking the quality and specs of different types of monitors.

From triage, reusable desktops and laptops go to workshops, where more nitty-gritty steps are taken to fix them up, such as installing new processors, adding RAM memory or replacing the hard drives. Here's where I sketched volunteer coordinator Hannah Mandala working on a refurbished laptop. Mandala said volunteers love coming to Interconnection because they can get their hands on so many different types of computers.

And the process comes full circle when people show up at the retail store to purchase a refurbished computer. Chris Adams, a customer buying a used ThinkPad, said he came here not only for the cheaper prices but because he wants to support Interconnection's mission.

What has drawn your attention around Seattle lately? Send me your suggestions of interesting places and people to sketch via e-mail, Facebook or Twitter.

Meet me at the Seattle Central Library: I'm presenting my book, The Art of Urban Sketching, at The Seattle Central Library tomorrow Sunday, April 29, at 1 p.m. Before the talk, I'll also be joining the Seattle Urban Sketchers for some sketching. You are all invited to join us and come to the book talk.

Sketched April 10, 2012

Oh, spring at the U-Dub!

The best thing about it is that you don't have to pay tuition to enjoy it. Anyone can wander through campus, and there's much more to see than the striking, but fleeting cherry blossoms in the Quad.

This year, with the UW celebrating its 150th Anniversary ("HuskyFest" event wraps up Saturday), it was fitting that I discovered the Sylvan Grove Theater, home to some of the oldest-standing pieces of Seattle architecture: four, 24-foot Ionic columns that belonged to the original university building downtown.

The lush garden space, tucked between the Rainier Vista corridor and the Paul G. Allen Center for Computer Science & Engineering, is so secluded even some students miss it. Emilia Ptak, a recent graduate relaxing on a bench with a friend, didn't find it until her third or fourth year.

Unlike the Quad, she said, it's a quiet spot to concentrate and study.

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Other sketches from my stroll through campus:

Block letters are so collegiate. A plaque by this giant "W" says the sign was donated by the class of 1960.

Denny Hall is the first university building to open on the current campus, back in 1895. As I started to sketch, I could hear a tour guide address his group. "This is where we come from," he said, pointing to the castle-like building. "And this is where we are going," pointing to the state-of-the-art architecture of Paccar Hall to the east. Paccar Hall is home to the Michael G. Foster School of Business.

I think Emilia Ptak had a point when she told me that the Quad is better for people watching than studying. On the sunny day I visited, the sensory overload was such that I can't imagine anyone being able to concentrate there.

I sat on the steps of the Suzzallo Library building to sketch this view. Students crisscrossed the square in all directions on their way to class. Others stood under blue-covered tents, holding balloons and handing out fliers. When I finished my sketch, I walked over to the other side of the square to order a pulled-pork sandwich from a food truck, then sat on the benches at the center of the square to eat and remember my own college days at another beautiful campus, the University of Navarra in Pamplona, Spain.

What has drawn your attention around Seattle lately? Send me your suggestions of interesting places and people to sketch via e-mail, Facebook or Twitter. Have a great weekend!

A common question I'm often asked about my work method is whether I use pencil or draw directly in ink.

For the most part, I stay away from pencil --unless I'm doing a pencil sketch-- for several reasons. Inking previously drawn pencil outlines can diminish the feeling of freshness and spontaneity that makes sketches interesting. The added step of penciling before inking also makes the process longer. What I normally sketch in 20 or 25 minutes would take me 45 minutes to an hour, including coloring, if I penciled first.

But in some cases I use pencil to block out the main elements of a composition. Pencil comes in handy to mark the horizon line and vanishing points when you are drawing wide open spaces and want to get the perspective right. That was the case with the drawing of Gregory Harrop's poem bench, or with my lead sketch of the streetcar on this other story. In such cases, if the perspective isn't fairly accurate, the drawings start to fall apart.

I like to keep the lines light and not overdoing them, using a 2B pencil. Some sketchers erase them before inking --a kneaded eraser won't damage the paper--, but I mostly let the pencil marks be part of the final drawing. You may call that a "transparent" approach to sketching, where no tricks are hidden to the viewer's eye!

Sketching results by artists who use pencil before inking vary greatly. That's a good thing about sketching. Whatever method you use, your unique style will still come through. For example, just compare the work of Thomas Thorspecken with the work of Gérard Michel. Both start their sketches with some pencil outlines, yet their final results are completely different.

Sketched March 20, 2012

I often try to capture the poetry of the urban landscape with my pen, but this is the first time I've come across actual poems on the streets.

On Capitol Hill's Aloha Street, I found Mary Kollar's poetry box, which she fills each month with a timely poem. She started the ritual in 2004 as a protest against presidential candidates who were butchering "the beauty of the English language."

Many passers-by pick up the poem, she said, like the jogger who stops to read it to her mom over the phone every month, or the boy who reads it aloud to his dad after school.

Kollar's box has also inspired other poetry shrines. The biggest may be Gregory Harrop's "poem bench" in Wallingford, where you can "Sit a while, read a poem. If you like it, take one home. If you don't, that's O.K. There will be another one on Monday."

Happy National Poetry Month!

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Kollar also mentioned this poetry box on 20th Avenue East and East Aloha Street. She said it belongs to Guy Holliday, a local poet who shares his own writings.

On Greenwood Avenue North and North 82nd Street I found this psychedelic mail box that invites passers-by to take a free poem and "S M ILE."

What has drawn your attention around Seattle lately? Send me your suggestions of interesting places and people to sketch via e-mail, Facebook or Twitter. Have a great weekend!

Sketched, March 13, 2012

When the South Lake Union streetcar opened in late 2007, I wondered who would ride those brightly colored cars.The dormant neighborhood of warehouses and light industry didn't strike me as a destination. But since Amazon opened its campus here, I've seen more people riding the 1.3-mile line.

Amazon employee Guhan Venkatesan, who lives in Sammamish, said the streetcar is really convenient to reach his office after busing downtown. He admitted he could sometimes walk instead, "but I would have to walk very briskly."

Venkatesan wasn't the only Eastside commuter I met on the streetcar.

Joe Schulman (left), a young fellow wearing a stylish hat and reading on a Kindle, commutes from Bellevue by bus and takes the streetcar at the Westlake Hub. His stop arrived before I could ask him many questions, but he later sent me an email with his feedback. He wrote that the streetcar is only practical if he gets lucky and catches one. Otherwise it takes him less time to walk the mile than it does to wait and ride. But "if it ran twice as frequently then I would never consider walking," he wrote.

Lindsay Stratton (below, left) a biologist at Fred Hutchinson, also takes a bus from Bellevue to downtwon before hopping on one of the streetcars. She said she appreciates the service, especially on rainy days, and that it gives the city a European vibe. "It looks more like Amsterdam," she said.

The current scene in South Lake Union makes it easier to picture more streetcars cruising through another employment hub, First Hill, in the spring of 2014. Construction of that line between Pioneer Square and Capitol Hill begins next month.

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I visited the streetcar maintenance facility on Fairview Avenue a couple of days after drawing the sketches posted above. Coincidentally, the same purple car I had drawn while holding my umbrella at the Westlake Hub was now parked indoors for a routine inspection.

Operations chief Dale Lewis shared more technical facts than I could retain as I quickly outlined this sketch under the front bogie of the parked car. But a few things he said stuck with me, like the fact that these cars came from the Czech Republic. Lewis said that Czech engineers used to be the go-to technicians for the streetcar lines of all former Soviet countries and the central European nation has become a leading manufacturer.

Lewis worked with several Czech engineers here during the first years of operation. He said a team of two or three were always on deck during the first two years --while the cars were under warranty-- and they all shared an apartment in Green Lake.

Streetcar maintainer Lou Swan is a 32-year employee of King County Metro, the agency that operates the city-owned line. Streetcars are not new to this veteran mechanic, as he was assigned to the Waterfront Streetcar in the early 2000s.

Streetcar operator John Nolan told me about some of the challenges of driving the 60-foot long cars through busy traffic and distracted pedestrians who pay more attention to their cellphones than to the street. Since steering away is not an option, he has to do a lot of honking and ringing to alert them.

"People take it the wrong way, but I just don't want to hit them," he told me as he was getting ready to turn the car on and drive down Westlake Avenue.

What has drawn your attention around Seattle lately? Send me your suggestions of interesting places and people to sketch via e-mail, Facebook or Twitter. Have a great weekend!