Last week I left home for a big 2 month trip to Europe. My first stop was Glasgow when I had 24 hours to do a little solo sketching and get a good night’s sleep. It’s been 6 years since I did a long haul flight and I was wondering how I would go.

Although I felt a bit ‘spacey’ (which was apparent in my eye-hand coordination) I had no real jet lag. And I managed to sketch a lot during my stay in Glasgow.

Here are a few of my sketches…

First stop was a coffee shop – and I was served my coffee in a Wil Freeborn cup! Wil was the first urban sketcher I met (many years ago!) so it was a nice connection with past sketching visits.

While I was sipping my coffee I made my way to the most complicated building in Glasgow – the City Chamber Building in George Square. Doing this free-flowing line drawing was a great way to warm up and get used to being in Scotland again.

Next I walked to Greek Thomson’s magnificent St Vincent St Church and had fun sketching it in Neocolor II (dry) and a little fountain pen.

The next morning (after a great night’s sleep) I headed back to the same cafe and sketched the view looking down the street. The water tower was designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

I then headed towards the cathedral and really enjoyed sketching St Mungo Museum. This sketch contains my three new obsessions:

• In my palette… Daniel Smith Bloodstone Genuine (a colour that I’ve used before) and Michael Harding Warm Light Yellow
• Sailor 023 ink in my fountain pen a TSWBI Eco with a stub nib.

I’ve been talking about these colours inside my Sketching Adventure Community on Patreon for the last few months and it’s great to be using them together so much on this trip.

I then went inside the cathedral and did a sketch of the interior (ink and water-soluble graphite). This is a screenshot of a video I filmed for Patreon.

(Note: I haven’t yet got around to photographing most of my sketches!)

A quick line drawing of the Necropolis using a Pilot Parallel Pen with De Atramentis Document Fog Grey. (another coloured ink and pen combo that I’m loving a lot so far this trip).

I had a lovely catchup with Liz Reid – admin for Urban Sketchers Glasgow. She has been helping me organise a sketch meet for when I return to Glasgow in early August – more details coming soon!

It was then time to head to the airport – get on a small plane and fly to the Isle of Lewis where I’m spending time with my sister and her family.

I’ve been doing more sketching than I expected so far this trip and I’ve been filming a lot of video clips that I’ve been sharing with members of my community. I’ll be sharing reference photos with them as well so they can sketch along with my travels. If you sign up to become a member you will also have access to 7 trip prep videos where I made decisions about what art materials to take with me. (Note: I’ve used nearly everything already!)  Check it out here.

If you want up to date highlights I’m also sharing to my Instagram stories.

I’ve been having such a wonderful time so far – stay tuned for lots of beach sketching in the next update article.