Here’s a little project, an accordion book full of little sketches made while on walks in my neighborhood.
A big chunk of it was made on a weekend where I wandered around, book in hand, stopping and drawing wherever I felt like.
And then I added a few sketches over the rest of the week until it was done. Here are some later additions.
A grey day in my local park, listening to woodpeckers in the trees while I sketched.
A sketch of the view from the front steps, looking out at my neighbors golden tree and very blue car.
And one last sketch of construction in the neighborhood before the book was done.
I really like the how the idea of a walk and a linear layout like this book tie together so effortlessly and I’m already thinking of other experiences and sketches that could work well with this format.
Have you sketched in an accordion-style book before? (This one is the ZigZag book). How did you like the format? Any challenges that came up in using it?
Sketch Away: Travels with my sketchbook 
so inspiring !!
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I had never used one before being gifted one by an insightful friend. To my surprise it worked out perfectly for a week long holiday at the beach. All the scenes seemed to meld together really well even though I changed up my style a bit as I went. I generally matched horizon lines across the scenes which helped with the visual flow, and placed extra vignettes into corners of the pages where nothing much was happening in the main scene. The pleasant finding from the format was how freeing it was to end the sketch where I wanted rather than trying to fit the page, and I started to deliberately cross the fold line in some compositions. I used the reverse side (which had less texture and less pages) to do simple color studies of clouds (at the beach).
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elaine, that is a good point: the “endless” nature of the book frees you from a page border. Your book full of memories sounds lovely.
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I would be afraid to use this format. Not all my sketches are successful, and I would hate to mess up the whole book with a few regrettable entries.
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suzanne, there are a couple of sketches that you describe as “regrettable” in this book, but I find that when seen together as a whole experience, the less successful ones are okay too, they’re just a part of the journey across the page.
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I do a lot of zentangle, and often, at the onset, I make a mistake. Sometimes I start over, but sometimes I just continue. Surprisingly, by the time I’m done, the error recedes so as to be almost invisible, and charming instead of jarring.
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Nice sketches, I really like your Guadalupe Oak Grove.
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I love the sketchbook; but in your videos, can you hold your phone horizontally, so we get the wide screen?
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i shot this for instagram, Andrea, I’ll do another video sometime…
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