November's sketching trip to Sutton House

Six artists met at Sutton House on Friday to spend time drawing, and exploring, this fascinating and atmospheric Tudor house that over the centuries has been renovated, added to, divided and fianlly restored to one dwelling. It was built in 1535 by a prominent courtier of Henry VIII, Sir Ralph Sadleir when Hackney was a village outside London. Now Hackney is a large borough in London and lost any rural charm it had a very long time ago.

However if you spend any time in the house or garden you can still feel a sense of peace and quiet and it is easy to feel you have accidentally slipped back in time.

So, while we all withdrew into our individual worlds while sketching variously in the Linenfold Parlour, the Cellar, the Georgian Parlour, the Great Hall and the garden we were able later to come together and chat in the café and admire each other's work and look forward to future sketching outings.

Next sketching outing is Friday 14 November to Sutton House

Now the weather is getting distinctly colder we have decided to move under cover with our sketch books for the next few months. We are planning a sketching trip to Sutton House in Hackney on Friday 14 November at 11am. It was built by Ralph Sadleir who was a courtier of Henry VIII and he lived in the household of Thomas Cromwell from the age of 14. The house features in Woolf Hall by Hilary Mantel and is steeped in history.

This is a National Trust property so admission is free to National Trust members. The charge for non-members is £3.50 and if there is a group of eight or more the price is reduced to £2.70 per person, they do not offer concessions. We can take dry materials with us but because of the historic nature of some of the rooms I believe we cannot use painting materials. There is a café which opens at 12 noon.

It is quarter of a mile walk from Hackney Central overground station which can be reached from Highbury & Islington station and the 106 bus from Finsbury Park runs close by the house. You can find a link for directions to a Google map here.

Art in the Park outing on 23 October

The weather was quite good for our latest Art in the Park session in the Crouch End Open Space, with sunshine, and light cloud. Four sketchers gathered, including one from Hackney who had used her satnav to navigate into the off-the-A-to-Z area of CREOS! We were greeted by the Chair of CREOS, who kindly offered us the use of the facilities in her home, which was not far away. Our own Islington Art Society Chair, Virginia Jackson, also visited us in between her activities connected with the IAS's forthcoming exhibition.

We found plenty of subjects to sketch and had a very pleasant time in the sylvan surroundings of the Hanley Tennis Club. At the end of the morning, we went to the Royal Palace Cafe in Park Road for lunch and art talk, including a discussion of future Art in the Park locations.

Art in the Park 23 October: Update

Stop Press News for Art in the Park sketching day on Thursday 23 October:   unfortunately we will not be able to use the facilities (for shelter if it is wet, lavatories, kettle and coffee mugs) in the Hanley Club House, due to illness.

We are still meeting in the car park (council-owned so free and accessible) beside the Hanley Tennis Club at 10.30 tomorrow, but the nearest lavatory and hot drinks will be at Royal Palace Café a five minute walk northwards along Park Road at 298 Park Road (at the junction with Cranley Gardens). So please bear this in mind!

Our October sketching outing is on the 23rd in Crouch End Open Space

The October Art in the Park sketching outing will be in the Crouch End Open Space/Shepherds Cot. This is an area of woodland, playing fields, tennis courts, clubhouses, and old trees. It is an opportunity to do tree studies – there are a number of very old oak trees and pollarded limes – and autumn colour work. The leaf colour is more muted Gainsborough than New England at present, but very pretty, especially in sunshine. It is also a good opportunity to paint skyscapes seen above the trees. Please bring your sketching stools.

We will assemble at about 10.30am in the lane outside the HanleyTennis Club where we will be based. They have kindly agreed that we can use their lavatory, and their kettle and mugs, and the Clubhouse will be open from 11 am for the morning, and possibly longer if there are Club members playing tennis. Please bring such tea/coffee/sugar and milk as you require.

If you plan to arrive by car via Park Road, Crouch End, the entrance is a small tarmac lane situated off Park Road (A1201) opposite Park Avenue South. This takes you into the Shepherd's Cot Trust grounds (the whole area of Metropolitan Open Land). Follow the lane and do not branch left at Georgian's tennis club. Keep going straight until you can go no further and reach a small car park. Entrance to Hanley is on your left via a small gate. Parking is free. and the map is here.

Alternatively, there is a car park accessible from Montenotte Road N8, (go down the lane beside Highgate Wood School) off Shepherds Hill, you will then have to walk past the Highgate Tennis Club and turn left at the T junction in the lane. If coming by bus, the W7 is the only bus which goes down Park Road, but there are other access points to the area, and the full range of bus services from Highgate Tube Station can be seen on the CREOS website here.

We suggest that you bring your own sandwich lunch, although lunches are available at the Victoria Stakes pub a short walk northwards along Park Road, and there are one or two cafés on the opposite side of Park Road.

The weather forecast is reasonably warm (17C) and cloudy, but not rainy.

See you there!

September's visit to the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park

September's Art in the Park sketching trip was based in the third floor viewing gallery at the John Lewis store at Stratford Westfield overlooking the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Only two artists made it to this venue and we wondered if the logistics of getting there had put other people off from joining us.

The view from the panoramic picture window of the London Aquatic Centre and the stadium in the foreground with Canary Wharf in the background presented some interesting visual challenges. The enormous red ArcelorMittal Orbit sculpture posed the question 'Put it in or leave it out?' which we answered by putting it in.

The staff at John Lewis were charming and helpful and even moved a meeting they were having to another place so we could get on with our sketching. There were benches to sit on so we didn't need our sketching stools that we had taken with us and we were very close to those two important requirements: public lavatories and a café where we enjoyed a snack.

All in all we had a stimulating outing and were pleased to have produced work we wouldn't normally have done.

Next sketching date: Tuesday 23 September

We have decided to take an aerial view of the Olympic Park, Stratford for our next day out. As funds do not stretch to hiring a plane we are going to go to the third floor of John Lewis, Westfield Stratford store where they have a large viewing area and some big windows overlooking the site.

I am not sure what the view currently consists of as they have been rebuilding since the Olympic games but it will be interesting to draw a landscape/cityscape from above.

John Lewis are happy for us to sketch, including using watercolours, in this part of the store. Please bring your sketching stools. It will be relatively secluded, since the viewing platform is behind various shopping areas. The café is on the same floor – on the other side of the building – and we will be able to nip off easily to have lunch. Take the escalator to the top, walk forward through the children's clothes department and the windows are visible.

The address is: 101 The Arcade, Westfield Stratford City, London, E20 1EL. Hopefully, John Lewis  will be completely unmissable as one emerges from Stratford Regional Station, which includes the London Overground System as well as the tube. You can find further details here.

Start Time: 11am (the store opens at 10am). Sue's mobile number is: 079758 641 42.

Happy Painting!