Sketch 7: Three Couples, Three Generations, Sharing One Space

Yesterday was a typical lazy Saturday. Luckily, we went for a beer at The Old Bookbinders Ale House in Oxford, giving me some time to look around the neighbourhood. The Old Bookbinders pub spreads onto the street and provides a nice range of tables and benches that rest on the pavement and interact with the street. There, on a chilly, sunny evening, I encountered three couples enjoying their pints; a couple of young students, middle-aged husband and wife, and an older couple, all sharing this little public space. People were passing by, cycling or walking. Inside, people ate, drank, played board games and laughed... The mixture of activities and people turned my Saturday evening into a social event worth sketching!

...If you wonder how I manage to find time to sketch when passing by a front garden of a restaurant, I don't. I usually take a photo and sketch later, when I have time to sit down. Thinking back on what I saw makes me realise what exactly caught my attention and why. In an ideal scenario, I would love to sit right at the place of encountering a situation worth sketching, but I rarely get such an opportunity. The Sketching Project is about noticing and capturing moments from our public space. Therefore, the fact that I focus on experiencing the moments mindfully, capturing them in a sketch later, feels like a fair compromise to me.

Location: Oxford, UK

Daytime: 6 pm