Richard Bell's nature sketchbook since 1998
We believe that this old school chair was made by one of Barbara’s mum’s uncles. It looks handmade; slightly less regular than you’d expect if it had been the product of a workshop where hundreds were made.
My office chair is beginning to look worn, as the fabric on the seat begins to tear. It’s a look that is very much in fashion at the moment, at least when it comes to jeans.
I know that, when the next person walks into the waiting room, out of all the chairs, they’re going to go for the one that I’m drawing.
She does, but luckily by then I’ve drawn the chair itself and I can move on to the houseplant and the drawer unit next to it.
It’s a chair that would go well in the consulting room at 221b Baker Street.
Back at Barbara’s brother’s, I draw the end of the sofa that sits next to the laid-back armchair that set me off sketching seating last week.
It isn’t Holmesian like the wing-back, but it’s got enough character to be the centrepiece in a set for a retro situation comedy.
There are some drawable dining chairs at Filmore and Union in the Redbrick Mill in Batley but how can I resist drawing the box of fruit (and a head of broccoli) behind the counter.
I take a photograph, so that I can add the colour later (although I think that I could have managed perfectly well from memory this time).
This old car – a Morris Oxford? – brings back distant memories for me. That shade of pale green was popular in the late 1950s and early 60s; as I remember it, our Austin A40 was a similar colour.
Drawing this relaxed-looking armchair set me off; whenever I’ve had the odd moment during the last week, I’ve looked around for a chair to draw.
At Frankie & Benny’s, I focused on the chair itself and omitted the surroundings, such as the table leg in front of it.
As has so often happens, I started at the top but didn’t appreciate that I’d need to draw at a slightly larger scale to accommodate the detail of the chair’s back, so it has turned out taller and narrower than it should be.
Every detail of Frankie & Benny’s has been chosen to evoke the atmosphere of a 1950s New York Italian American diner: furniture, fittings and cut-out metal lettering. The F&B logo is brush-lettering, similar to the Walt Disney signature of the same vintage.
In a local independent cafe, Rich & Fancy on Queen Street, Horbury, the lettering on the blackboard is hand-drawn, and the chair is less chic and cosmopolitan.
Pizza Express goes for a retro style that might have earned a Design Council label in the 1960s.
Back in the studio, I was at last able to study a chair which wasn’t partially obscured by a table, a customer or a waitress.
The folding Ikea chair gives me a better chance to observe the negative spaces between the tubular metal framework and the plastic seat and back: triangles and shapes that remind me of a wedge of cheese with the nose cut off.