Not your usual dining room

 A chance to visit The King's Observatory in Richmond, built by George III in 1769 to observe the transit of Venus. Its current owner made his money in shipping in the Far East, and has put into his dining room a marvellous 18th century painting showing the foreigners' areas of Hong Kong. It's an enlarged reproduction that fits the room exactly, painted on silk by contemporary artists in Wuxi, and is full of detail -

The table looks at first glance to be octagonal, but is in fact nine-sided -

Drawing Tuesday - roofscape / streetscape

While scrolling through Instagram I came across what looked like a roofscape, or skyscape perhaps. And I was intrigued by how the drawing was done (other similar examples @aschoppel). Her drawings are large and obviously took hours - she started the grid at the edge and worked inward.

When I started a little sample, in my A6 notebook, just to see how it might turn out, it became clear that "just copying" that drawing wouldn't be possible. To do the drawing properly would be to do it large, and to experiment to see what would evolve when I used the method with the objective of seeing how it worked for me. In other words - start at square one and develop my own version, which would certainly look different - for instance, Amanda's squares are so perfect, each in itself, and mine are sloppy. She must have done many variations to get to this one.

I put on a nice podcast (99% Invisible) and started with a circle of converging squares -

As results go, it was more like a Mayan calendar disk than it was like skyscrapers. Try again -

Happier with that, but I can tell you it took ages, and it was small...

From Janet K - The view from our bed.

From Richard - Is this a roofscape or the earlier view out of our window? Both. Fast-changing clouds and shadows, so no dawdling in watercolour!

From Sue S - Here is my sketch from our top landing. rooftop view with intermittent sun. Caran d’ache & neocolour. 

From Ann - This was a watercolour I completed a few weeks ago, of the house opposite.  

From Judith - I put together a montage of sketches from Peratallada and Pals in Catalonia and a roofscape from a Peratallada photo.

From Carol - The view of endless loft conversions and skips at home made me depressed so we escaped to Norwich where they have lovely chimneys.

From Hazel - A view from a bedroom window using pencil, pen and watercolour. Glad that the postman arrived!

From Mags - discovered the 'panorama' function on my phone , taking photos from underneath the parasol, altered in Photoshop using ' Find Edges' and 'Palette Knife' filters

From Sylvia -  revisited old sketch books for this one - cottages in village where I grew up, and camera obscura Edinburgh

From Joyce - the view from the train after leaving Blackfriars before descending to City Thameslink. From a photo taken before lockdown, hope to make the journey again one day soon! Dip pen and sepia ink.

From Jo - MICRO CEREAMI PEN REVIEW 0.5 (BLACK) KOREA is what it says on the pen! With water it goes this weird blue colour. I wish it had been black, but it is lovely to write with.

From Gillian - View from a back bedroom window

From Jackie - Here is a pen and ink sketch from the National Portrait Gallery restaurant… found in my files and reminiscent of those times before any notion of restricted movement due to the dreaded virus… 

It is a bit more inspiring than the view from my loft window!

From Sue B - well…that was one of the hardest things for me this week…could NOT get the angles right!!!!…so…i got distracted by painting the INSIDE of the windows and curtains in my drawing room…and then dodged and dived over 3 days to try and get the houses opposite and their rooftops!!

Horreos of Galicia

Horreos, those granaries that can be found all over Galicia - the aim is to keep rats etc getting in, hence the ledges and round stones. Are they still used, I wonder?

Behind the dovecote in "the medieval bridge village"

Quite often there were several in the same place

Some need a bit of TLC

Unusually solid

Beside the town cemetery

Even in the fishing town of Fisterra!

The final photo was found somewhere in Porto - perhaps the hinterland has horreos as well, the espigueiros - these look amazing, I want to sit among them with a sketchbook!

They do have a touch of the necropolis about them, or of the relic casket, but mostly they're humble buildings well suited for their purpose, and that's what intrigues me, the simple shape and its variations - and occasional flourish.