I’m super excited to announce that I’m hosting a Live Version of my Sketchbook Design course – starting on Wednesday 9th Sept 2026.

It’s been a few years since I have been able to host an interactive version of this course (with weekly livestreams), so this is a big event.

I firmly believe any page can be made interesting by spending a little time designing the layout and adding notes and other elements.

This design can elevate your sketchbook in amazing ways: Pages that contain sketches which you were not 100% happy with at the time can become your favourites!

This month I’m spending a lot of time working on pages from my two France Trip sketchbooks – thanks to the monthly theme of Finishing Touches inside our Sketching Adventure Community on Patreon. And I’ve been reminded of how much this extra time in my sketchbook, once I’m back home, increases my connection to my sketches and pages. My France books are even more precious to me now that I’ve been able to finish pages – adding a few final touches to my sketches, and including notes and other design elements.

I’m now even more committed to doing this with my everyday sketchbooks, and so this Live Version of Sketchbook Design is coming at a perfect time.

I always get so much inspiration from the beautiful pages created by the cohort as we go through the lessons.

Here are some examples from previous cohorts.

Very inspiring, aren’t they?

The Live Version starts on Wednesday 9th September, and we’ll go through the on-demand video lessons over 9 weeks. Here is the schedule that we’ll follow:

Introduction (1 week) – starting Wed 9 Sept
Lesson 1: Adding elements (2 weeks) – starting Wed 16 Sept
Lesson 2: Contained compositions (2 weeks) – starting Wed 30 Sept
Lesson 3: Open compositions (2 weeks) – starting Wed 14 Oct
Lesson 4: Designing on the fly (2 weeks) – starting Wed 28 Oct

Each week, we’ll catch up in a bonus live session (held at alternating times to suit every time zone) to recap the current themes and look at work from the classroom. These livestreams are so much fun! Livestream dates and times are listed on this page.

Here’s a brief overview of the course with some images from the video lessons.

You’ll learn how to…

Add elements to your pages such as: text, headings, borders, maps, secondary sketches and colour blocks.

Design contained compositions where your sketches and other elements are separate – with distinct white space around them.

Create open compositions: keeping corners open, extending, combining, overlapping or random placement.

Explore ways of using either open or contained compositions – or a combination of both!

Sketch spontaneously and design on the fly when sketching out on location to create a sequence of pages that relate to each other.

Use a few practical design principles to create interesting pages without spending a lot of time planning beforehand.
 

Find out more about Sketchbook Design here

Finally…

To celebrate the Live Version, I’m making three Sketchbook Design Intro Lessons available for a limited time only (until 10 Sept 2026).

These cover the following topics:

• Why keep a sketchbook? (including some teacup demos!)
• Tips for architect’s handwriting
• How to choose a sketchbook

To get these free lessons, all you have to do is sign up for them here.
 

Please let me know below if you have any questions about Sketchbook Design!