Drawing takes time. A line has time in it.

David Hockney

We all began our journey in art and sketching with tiny doodles on the corners of pages, or on our palms. While for many of us, it stopped there, there are some who recognized the beauty of sketching, and took it further.

Sketching for an architect is all about capturing what they see in a structure.
Sitting in front of a structure, gazing at it for hours, trying to observe every detail not only calms the mind, but creates a sense of belonging in that place, and the artist remembers that moment forever. It is a therapeutic form of exercise for many.
Here we try to learn about what the art of sketching means, from Kajal Garhwal, a student of architecture and our very own artist at Carving Cubes.

My journey of sketching started during a remarkably boring physics class, when I started doodling with the random black pen I found in my hand, and later rendered again with the same. I realized it was not only fast, but also effective. Loving the final pieces, I started practicing bigger sketches, eventually trying out different mediums.

Sketches is really good for creative minds, as the process of observing the minute details brings a great knowledge of the structure, construction and décor, background and culture. This is something which is very helpful in a historical context too, photographing it doesn’t show us the many nuances that sketching does. So the space fits in the memory forever.

Not everyone is comfortable in every medium. Even master artists have one or two favorite mediums and one or two which they are really bad at. Finding that comfort zone is really important, it gives you the confidence needed.

I wasn’t aware of many mediums, I was only good at acrylics. I never felt comfortable in using pencil colours. They look shabby and are very slow. For me, my niche was finding alcohol markers. Once I did, it was all I ever used, and eventually the practice really helps.

Every individual has their own way of sketching, so even the same structure or space comes out differently in every person’s own way in their sketches, while it remains the same in photographs. This is especially important in architecture where we need to create an identity in our work.

My architectural sketching style is by using a lot of black lines, bold and fragile, and highlighting with alcohol markers. The effect looks great, and especially in architecture where a lot of live sketching is required and valued, this works really well!

Many non-artists are afraid to try out new sketches, for the fear of failure. But, it’s not about the paper or the colors, it’s about you and the space, interacting with each other in a way which no one else gets to see, but which is poured out into your sketch. There is nothing right or wrong, good or bad. It’s about what you feel in a space and what you make the viewer feel while seeing your sketch.