The Shard from Greenwich Pier

Yesterday I did this sketch of The Shard and London skyline on the River Thames from a seat in front of the Old Royal Naval College/Hospital at Greenwich - just beyond Greenwich Pier.

So first here's the sketch. There were amazing clouds yesterday. I was half tempted just to sketch the sky!

The Shard from Greenwich Pier
pen and ink and coloured pencils in Moleskine Sketchbook, 10 x 8inches
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Next is the Moleskine Sketchbook with pencils as I was finishing

Sketchbook and pencils - nearly finished
As you can see quite an assortment of pencils are used - I'm not a dedicated one brand only person.

then the sketchbook again - but this time with the view

The Shard is in the distance and Greenwich Pier is in the foreground
He who must be bored while I sketch holds up my sketchbook for the photo with the view
(He was reading 'Shakespeare' by Bill Bryson - while I sketched. Looked interesting!)

and finally a pic of the place where I was sketching

We were sat on the seat just in front of the Old Royal Hospital - which is now the University of Greenwich.
I was looking up the river past the end of the pier on the left
If you sit at this spot you usually get the sound of somebody practising a musical instrument
coming out of the windows behind you!

Greenwich Heritage, Canary Wharf and the O2 Dome

Following on from Sailing ships and the City of London from Greenwich Park, here are two more double page spreads which made up my Greenwich Park Panorama

The middle section looks:

• over the Equestrian Arena in Greenwich Park constructed for the Olympics and 
• past the Queens House and the Old Royal Naval College which form an important part of "Maritime Greenwich" (the Royal Borough of Greenwich's UNESCO approved World Heritage Site)
• across the River Thames (past the Thames Sailing Barge with its rust red sails)  
• to the Isle of Dogs and the new business centre at Canary Wharf.  

If you keep going past the tall office buildings at Canary Wharf you'd come to where I live in East London!

Greenwich panorama sketch towards Canary Wharf11 x 16" pen and ink and coloured pencils
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

You can also see this sketch on Flickr where I've annotated it with the names of seven structures,  places and objects in the sketch.  You have to love your cursor over the picture to see the white line boxes which relate to each item which has been annotated.

The Eastern 'downstream' section of my panoramic sketch is below.  It's looking over North Greenwich and Stratford on the other side of the Thames.

Greenwich panorama sketch towards O2 Arena (former Millennium Dome)11 x 16" pen and ink and coloured pencils
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Ditto - the sketch on Flickr hows you what you can see - including the Olympic Stadium in Stratford.  Move your cursor around the Flickr Version to see the annotations explaining the buildings - and see if you can find the Olympic Stadium!

If you want to visit Greenwich and also sketch this view see the map of Greenwich Park (pdf file).  I was sat at the end of Blackheath Avenue just to the right of the Royal Observatory

Urban Sketchers London SKETCHCRAWL in Greenwich tomorrow

Many of you will have seen Greenwich Park and some of the heritage and very historic buildings to be found in Royal Greenwich while watching the Olympics and Paralympics.

Tomorrow you can sketch them with Urban Sketchers London.  You are invited to join us in Greenwich for a day of sketching around and about.

This is a link to the Cutty Sark DLR Station where people will be meeting up.  Use the TfL Journey Planner to get to the station - and remember to make sure that the DLR option is enabled.

What to sketch in Greenwich

There are masses of places to sketch in Greenwich.  The problem is working out where to start and how much you can fit in on the day!

Below are details about some of the things you can see.  (Why not bookmark this post for tomorrow?)

• Links in the address are to a map of where this is located. The aerial view on the Royal Museums website for Greenwich gives an excellent view of the location of the different museums and what Greenwich has to offer.
• Links in the names of the places are to the website for that place

The Cutty Sark

• Address: Cutty Sark Clipper Ship, King William Walk, Greenwich, London SE10 9HT - 
• Opening hours: Monday–Sunday 10.00–17.00, last admission 16.00.  Note that entry to the ship is by time ticket only
• Did you know that you can now go on board and go beneath the vessel? The rehabilitation of this very famous tea clipper has resulted in vastly improved viewing facilities

The Royal Observatory 

• Address: Blackheath Ave, London SE10 8XJ
• Transport: road | tube & rail | cycle | bus | river
• open daily between 10.00–17.00, last admission 16.30 
• This is at right at the top of the hill in Greenwich Park.  This is also.....
• ... the home of the Prime Meridian aka the Greenwich Meridian

Greenwich Park

• this was used for the equestrian events in the Olympics.  
• There's a stunning view of London from the hill.   
• You can download a detailed map of the Park
• Public access to Greenwich Park this summer is the official statement about which parts of the Park will have been reopened by 15th September. 
• From 14 September the areas of the park which will not be immediately accessible to the public include area in front and to the west of the Queen's Field and an area behind The Children's Playground, near Maze Hill Gate.
• Public vehicles will be permitted in the park from 14 September with vehicle access to Blackheath Avenue and parking possible from this date.

The National Maritime Museum

• Address: Park Row, Greenwich London SE10 9NF Located at the bottom of the hill and south of Romney Road.
• Transport: road | tube & rail | cycle | bus | river
• open daily between 10.00–17.00, last admission 16.30 
• 
  

The Old Royal Naval College 

• This is a site map
• Painted Hall - a good place to go if it's wet - but always worth seeing whatever the weather.
• this provides the classic Canaletto view - but you have to go north of the river to see this! (Or to my blog post - A Canaletto View).  This is not impossible as you can use the Greenwich Foot Tunnel to walk under the Thames.  I've not done this for years but my recollection is that this is only for those who like steps.  To check the current status of the foot tunnel, you can call 020 8921 8334 during office hours or 020 8854 8888 after hours. However the website says this 

The Greenwich Foot Tunnel is now accessible on both sides by stairs and lift 24 hours a day. The stairs in the Greenwich tunnel may need to be closed on a short-term basis during parts of the works, but the lifts will remain open.

A Canaletto View (2nd June 2007)
(the Old Royal Naval College, Greenwich from Island Gardens on the Isle of Dogs)
8" x 10", pen and sepia ink and coloured pencil in Moleskine sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

The Queen's House is closed until 22 September.

Greenwich Market provides lots of opportunities for sketching for those who like markets - but can get a bit crowded

Views of the River Thames - from the walkway next to the Thames.

• The Trafalgar Tavern provides a good place to view the Thames or a place to be sketched!

NOTE:  This is the Meetup page for this Sketchcrawl.  You can register if you intend to come on this Sketchcrawl

The view from Greenwich Park Hill

This Easter has been the warmest and sunniest for a very long time. So on Easter Monday we took ourselves off to Greenwich Park and sat on the hill, basked in the sunshine and looked at London.

Easter Monday - The view from Greenwich Park Hill
11" x 16", pencil and coloured pencils in Folio Moleskine sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

We have a rule which states we never ever get in a car and drive out of London on a bank holiday - especially if it's sunny.  The queues of traffic trying to get back into London in the evening can be horrendous.

So we did the next best thing.  We drove down to the bottom of the Isle of Dogs, admired the Canaletto view of the Old Royal Naval College from Island Gardens and then caught the Docklands Light Railway through to the other side of the River and emerged next to the huge renovation scheme which is the Cutty Sark (it was the victim of a fire - and according to the website will reopen in 2012).

Painted Hall

James Thornhill

We then walked through the ground of the Old Royal Naval College - now the University of Greenwich - a central location within the Maritime Greenwich UNESCO World Heritage Site.  We paid a visit to the Painted Hall and admired the paintings commissioned by James Thornhill
 (seen on the right in one of the paintings - with his paint brushes and palette). 

Thornhill started his commission in1708 and did not finish until 19 years later in 1728!  What's remarkable about the Hall is it he used a lot of trompe l'oeil to achieve the effect of sculpture.

This Hall - just in front of this painting - was also where Lord Nelson's body lay in state for three days following his death at the Battle of Trafalgar.  30,000 people came to pay their respects before the coffin was moved up the river by barge for the funeral at St Paul's Cathedral.

Having had our history lesson for the day, we then walked across the road and entered the park and walked up the hill until we found somewhere high enough up and reasonably flat where I could sketch.

The main purpose of this expedition was to try out the new portable chairs I'd bought.  In the event I found out that they set up and fold up easily, go in a bad which is easy to carry and are exceptionally comfortable to sit for sketching purposes when the ground is not completely flat!  (Review to follow on Making A Mark Reviews).  Which means they'll be going to Provence!

The sketch shows the view while sat a smidgen to the east of the Greenwich Meridian, just below the Royal Observatory - the home of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT)

I'd been watching the excellent documentary on LS Lowry the night before and decided I had to have a go at some matchstick men as here were an enormous number of people in the park sunbathing and enjoying picnics and games.  I discovered matchstick men are not as easy as they look!  I've included nowhere near as many people as were actually there!

I also discovered on the way home that the way to climb hills with my dreadful foot - which is still causing problems - is to walk up backwards.  I looked very silly but it was a lot less painful and a lot faster!

Next time I must remember to sit nearer the top of the hill!

Then home via Waterstones, where I found three new art books to buy(!), and the DLR.

Greenwich - very nearly sitting on zero

Nearly sitting on zero
(The Greenwich Observatory and the Prime Meridien)
pencil and coloured pencils in sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Greenwich is a world heritage site with a wonderful mix of the historical, the maritime and the scientific. On Friday last week we went to visit the National Maritime Museum in the Royal Park in Greenwich. After the museum closed, I sat behind the Museum and the covered walkway which connects it to the Queens House and looked up at Greenwich Park and sketched the Royal Observatory on top of the hill - which is where the Prime Meridian lies - hence the title 'Very nearly sitting on Zero'.

Prime Meridian and the Royal Observatory

For anybody not familiar with the Prime Meridian this is the meridian (line of longitude) at which longitude is defined to be 0°.

Every place on Earth is measured in terms of its distance east or west from the Greenwich Meridan. The line itself divides the eastern and western hemispheres of the Earth, just as the Equator divides the northern and southern hemispheres.
Royal Observatory - Meridien Line

I keep having a go at trying to work out exactly where the meridian goes and whether or not my home lies on it too. For a long time I rather suspected my home was just off it and that it actually runs through the site of the Olympics in 2012 to the east of me.

This time when I got back I checked it on Google Earth and I was right. It runs north from the Observatory - to the right of the Isle of Dogs (where Canary Wharf is) - just to the left of the former Millennium Dome/O2 Arena and then goes straight up the site of the 2012 Olympics and exits from land through Hull!

The really weird thing is that it crosses straight through the southern entrance/exit to the Blackwall Tunnel - and I never knew all these years that I've been driving back and to through it!

National Maritime Museum

The Maritime galleries deal with Britain's encounter with the world at sea from the 16th to the early 20th centuries.
National Maritime Museum website

I hadn't been to the Maritime Museum for very many years and always remembered it as being very boring. However it's now apparently a top attraction for families after a transformation. "He who must not be bored while I sketch" found it really interesting whereas I now rate it as 'quite interesting' - given this is essentially "boy's toys" stuff!

We only scraped the surface of what is there but the bit I liked the best of what we saw was the display about the London Docks - then and now - in Maritime London. It was also rather amazing to be able to see, in Nelson's Navy, the uniform that Nelson was wearing when he received the fatal shot which killed him at Trafalgar in 1805 - complete with bullet hole. What was even more amazing was to see drawings, etchings and paintings of the absolutely amazing riverboat procession of Nelson's body from Greenwich up to London for burial.

I thought the maritime paintings were quite weak however I was able to see some of Whistler's Etchings from his Thames series - which I've only seen on the Internet before (see Making a Mark: Whistler Month: The Thames Set, Etching Papers and watermarks). The interesting thing about the etchings was how small they were - I'd no idea and had somehow always assumed that they were much bigger.

You can see all the galleries here - we only scratched the surface.

King Henry VIII and the Palace of Placentia

The Palace of Placentia
A sketch of Greenwich Palace in England published in the Gentlemen's Magazine in 1840.
source: wikimedia commons

We also discovered that the site at the edge of the river is the place where the Palace of Placentia used to be. You can read about it in the Tudors and Stuarts and Greenwich Fact Files.

The Palace of Placentia was an English Royal Palace built in 1447, in Greenwich, right next to the River Thames. The Palace was then demolished in the seventeenth century and replaced with the Greenwich Hospital in the late seventeenth century (which then became the The Royal Naval College and now Greenwich University) .

Cover of Greenwich by Charles Jennings

I've now got a new 'old' paperback called Greenwich - the place where days begin and end by Charles Jennings and will be reading up about all the things that went on there. It's got some very good reviews and I'm quite sure it's going to tell me things which I never knew before - here's just a few of the ones I found out on Friday.

For example, the Palace of Placentia was

• a principal royal palace for two centuries
  
• the birthplace of King Henry VIII and Mary Tudor and Elizabeth I
• Henry VIII used to spend a lot of time there - jousting in the tilting yards and visiting the Royal Dockyards which were not far away at Deptford.
• Elizabeth I used to like spending the summer at Greenwich.
  

I'm going to do some more reading and then I think I might do a series of sketches of Greenwich.

Links:

• Greenwich -- The place where Day Begin and End - Charles Jennings, Abacus
  
• National Maritime Museum, Greenwich Park, London, SE10 Tel. 020 8858 4422
• Trip Advisor - review of National Maritime Museum
• Royal Observatory, Greenwich, London SE10 9NF
  
• Tudors and Stuarts and Greenwich Fact Files
• Greenwich Tourist Information Centre, Pepys House, 2 Cutty Sark Gdns, London, SE10 9LW 0870 608 2000
• Travels with a sketchbook in......Greenwich
• Canary Wharf Sky 31st january 2007
• A Canaletto View
• 16th Worldwide Sketchcrawl - the result
• Boxing Day ice skating at Greenwich
• Trafalgar Tavern and low tide on the Thames