Chambers Street: Now and Then

Here we go! I've been unearthing some lovely photos of Edinburgh taken over the past two hundred years and reading about the history of these places I walk by every day. Yesterday I made these:

This is an illustration of the National Museum of Scotland, Chambers Street, and below is an illustration of the same spot drawn from a photograph taken in 1908. I found this photo in Batsford's Edinburgh, a beautiful book I stumbled upon in Edinburgh's Central Library.

I'm finding that the buildings, photographs and storied that interest me the most are those that have changed almost entirely from 'then' to 'now'. We are lucky enough in Edinburgh to still have so many historical buildings that have been here for hundreds of years, but it is fascinating to find images of shops and residential buildings that are no longer here. These buildings seem so full of life and stories, I hope I can keep finding images and information about these places and the people that inhabited them. 

So...where to next? I'm open to suggestions!

Now and then

Hello, hiya and hola! (seeing as this is my first post since returning from my trip to Spain. It was BRILLIANT.)

I was there with my very clever archaeology boy and while he was off being a real life underwater version of Indiana Jones (I'm pretty sure that's what he does) I managed to fill my days away sketching the amazing city of Cartagena. 

I treated myself to that new sketchbook I was banging on about and it is now filled with things like this.

and this

oh, and this

Then I came back to my own beautiful city and decided it was time for Edinburgh to become the focus of my illustrations again. So, I started a new project...

I have been sourcing photos of the city (the Central Library has a brilliant collection of images and information from Edinburgh's past, while Lost Edinburgh is another great resource). From these photos and the stories that surround them I've been drawing detailed images of key buildings as they were at points in the past, and then drawing how they look now.

Right now I am doing this in my evenings, as a wee indulgence and to keep myself sketching (as I resolved to do), but I am so fascinated by the images I'm finding and Edinburgh's vibrant past that I hope the project will grow into something...though I'm not yet sure what. So I guess I just keep drawing and see where it takes me.