Fenton St Arts Collective

The Fenton St Arts Collective in Stratford is well worth a look. Gallery, Espresso Bar and Distillery (Gin)  Jo and Stuart have a special spot in this vintage building.  Jo is very accomplished at figure and portraiture.

Urban Sketching , cars and cafe

OKOKI-KAKA Raods, north of Urenui in Taranaki. a day out with the Taranaki Sketchers.

Social Kitchen New Plymouth . wonderful café restaurant

Len Lye Centre, Govett Brewster Gallery , Monica's : NEW PLYMOUTH.

The re-furbished Govett Brewster Gallery and the Len Lye Centre have great exhibitions  which are fittingly matched by great service and coffee at Monica's. MLB

Rainy mornings in New Plymouth

More wet weather this week. This drawing was started last month. On a busy corner in New Plymouth, there's a cafe that looks out into the intersection. Since it's winter, it's still dark before work and the wet roads have lots of reflected light. I get a drink and sketch for about 15 minutes at a time. Now that it's August, I've noticed that I've filled up half a coffee card.

Paris Plage

Petite Paris operates Paris Plage out of a couple of shipping containers at the East End Reserve.  Well patronised by Coastal Walkway users.  Today was gorgeous - still and sunny.

Kings Building, New Plymouth NZ

The Kings Building is a landmark in the New Plymouth CBD. It houses  retail shops, upstairs commercial offices and a Penthouse which has a wonderful view of the New Plymouth waterfront. An interesting feature is that it is built over a stream . The downstairs premises were subject to occasional flooding before a flood protection scheme was constructed .  The eastern end of  the Kings Building includes the Espresso Cafe which now looks over the  Huatoki Plaza and uncovered part of the  Huatoki stream.  MLB  .

High Tide Coffees & More

A mobile coffee shop that usually hangs out at Oakura Beach, which is down the coast from New Plymouth. (I looked it up on Google.) It's currently in town for the arts festival evenings.

Chaos on WOMAD Weekend

New Plymouth was pretty busy on WOMAD weekend. Lots of world music fans from all over came to town to see the festival. In all fairness though, the people of Taranaki love their cooked breakfasts and coffees and this cafe is chaos EVERY weekend.

Poles & Signs

Now that's it's winter, the priorities of an urban sketcher seem to change. To me, when it's cold and wet, shelter becomes more important than finding that perfect view. It also helped that I was ordering warm coffees by a fireplace watching everyone else get cold.  At first I wasn't sure if I would want to draw out the window here. But then, as I watched the damp people shuffle around, I noticed all poles and signs from the window and decided to give this one a go. Also this building seems a bit art deco in a way but has modern shops with large glass windows, a glass top corner and glass overhangs. I wondered if this is an older building with modern renovations or a modern building with old-timey details. 

I also remember the time that a tornado ripped up this street and shattered the overhangs among the rest of the street's debris. I was working near here at the time of the tornado and can still clearly recall the slow walk up this way just after if happened. This area became a bit like a movie scene where someone fought off some aliens or robots.