Tag: Town Hall

Town Hall Pigeons

town pigeonpigeon9.20 a.m., Market Place, Ossett, 52°F, 13°C: A town pigeon perches on the antenna on the town hall roof then flies off in a stiff winged display flight. A stubble of rush-like spikes prevents these feral pigeons, descendants of the rock dove, from using sills, mouldings and cupolas as cliff ledges but the strings of Christmas lights still festooned across the facade provide an alternative perch. One has found a niche on a jutting corner.

elder on town hall roofpigeonIt’s not much more than a year since the building was given a major restoration but already two elders have sprouted and are blossoming in crevices in the stonework.

A black-headed gulls flies over and a swift soars around hawking for insects.

The Old Town Hall

clock
The Town Hall really does have a Toy Town look to it; that double chimney looks as if it could have been constructed from Victorian wooden building bricks.

Wetherby Town Hall is like the town hall you’d find in an old fashioned children’s story or a Wallace & Gromit adventure but, despite the doll’s house simplicity of its facade, I always find it difficult to get just the right angle when I’m drawing the pediment.

As it’s such a symmetrical building, drawing the facade is like drawing a portrait and small changes in an angle can change the expression on its ‘face’.

facadeIt’s a problem that I don’t mind coming back to. I drew the window during our coffee break – which included a wholemeal scone and honey – at Filmore & Union on the way to Knaresborough yesterday and the pediment after a walk by the River Wharfe at brunch today – when I opted for the healthy pancakes with coconut milk, seasonal fruit, maple syrup and Greek yoghurt.

Urban sketching can be so tough.

Link: Filmore & Union

Wallace & Gromit