I didn't do just wineries and landscapes when I was on my Virginia jaunt. I did on-site drawings of interesting architecture too. Lovingston, in central-west Virginia, is a small town where you can find 19th century commercial buildings like these in the illustrations. The top one is a private house which is also a law office, with a majestic carved-wood porch. Unfortunately, I made the drawing too small to show the ornament in any detail. The lower drawing is a main street shop front, with a characteristic Southern two-story porch.
Most of the commercial buildings on the historic Lovingston main street need some attention. No one has renovated them recently and many of the storefronts are empty. If I had heaps of money I'd renovate them and turn Lovingston into a cutesy tourist destination.
On-site outdoor sketching isn't as pleasant as it is cracked up to be by the purist artists who demand that you must be outdoors looking at the real thing when you draw or paint something. You have to find a place to sit and when you do, it is usually crawling with ants and other annoying insects, which bite exposed parts of you and cling to your clothes. Nevertheless I followed the Artistic Specifications to do these and I am still scratching some of the insect bites.
Black Pitt technical pen on sketchbook paper, about 6" x 9", August 16, 2012.
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