The Sketch Loose Method for Urban Ink and Watercolours

This flagship course is a complete guide to sketching urban scenes with ink and watercolour—the Sketch Loose way. Across seven workshops (and bonuses), you'll build skills that help you simplify, express, and sketch with confidence and freedom.

Course Objectives

1. Simplify Urban Scenes with Clarity and Confidence
   Learn to see through the clutter and capture the essence of a place—using shape, line, and contrast instead of overworked details.

2. Express Detail Without Getting Caught in It
   Understand how to suggest complexity through texture, mark-making, and selective focus—so your sketches feel rich, not rigid.

3. Build Confidence with Loose, Wet-on-Wet Watercolour
   Embrace flow, spontaneity, and bold colour choices through step-by-step guidance in wet techniques—including my Watercolour Magic approach.

4. Move Beyond the Rules and Sketch Intuitively
   Develop the skills and visual understanding to let go of rigid methods and create sketches that are personal, expressive, and uniquely yours.

This is a space for your own reflection - so you can look back at your answers when you have finished and see just how far you have come.

I'll share with you my progress, and I'd love to hear from you what you'd like to achieve in this course.

Simplicity and shapes are fantastic concepts to get started in sketching. But in this workshop, we'll move beyond these beginner's concepts to start you on the journey of developing your style.

We'll warm up first with thumbnail sketching, breaking down a scene in multiple different ways. Before looking at how shapes can be powerful, but limiting, with lots of examples and ideas for you to work on.

I'll show you how I think about the differences between shapes, contours and lines. And before you know it, you'll be tackling two complex scenes with a new found confidence.

These ideas underpin the entire of my sketching style. And this is a fresh new take on how to approach them.

As sketchers and urban sketchers, ink is often at the heart of what we do. In the previous workshop we looked at building up the outlines with shapes and contours. In this workshop we'll build up the heart of our sketch with hatching, textures and suggestions of detail.

The first two lessons will look at hatching, from basics, to next levels to much more advanced techniques. Before putting these ideas into practice on a lighthearted still life (see above!).

Then we'll look at how we can draw the effect of detail, without getting overwhelmed, and finish with a beautifully balance scene that puts into practice everything from these first two workshops.

This workshop is really exciting and packed with information. We'll start by refreshing our fundamentals with a lovely scene that allows us to explore my five step process whilst also delving into how to stop painting at the right time.

From there, we'll delve into some fascinating ideas that will open your eyes to the world of watercolours, and how to get the most out of their unique properties and interactions with water.

By the end of this workshop, expect to feel more comfortable with minimalist painting, keeping your colours flowing, and using wet-on-wet techniques.

Welcome to the Interludes—a collection of short, relaxing lessons designed to give you a creative breather.

These aren’t about perfect technique or big breakthroughs—they’re about staying loose, having fun, and trying something a little different. Dip in anytime during the course when you feel like a playful reset or a burst of inspiration. No pressure, no rules—just sketch, splash, and enjoy.

In this workshop we will focus on composition, contrast and "making your art interesting". We will open up by looking at the 'key ideas' I use when developing my composition, and quickly put these ideas into practice.

One of the most important concepts, though, (again!) is that less is more in composition. And I'm really excited to share with you some more of my ideas around minimalism and balance in a painting. As well as a delightful and enjoyable exploratory study that will help you to do less and have more fun.

By the end of this workshop, expect to feel more comfortable developing your focal point, creating contrast, but also feeling free-er in your choices and your process.

In this workshop we will focus back on our colours, looking at how to simplify our colours whilst making intentional decisions that help make our art more interesting.

We'll first have a look at the basics of colour theory, before quickly moving beyond that into sketching studies putting these ideas into practice.

I'll talk you through how to be more intentional in your colours, and we'll look at how colour choices start to define a part of your style as well. Before putting it all into practice with an exciting, bold and bright challenge.

By the end you'll understand more about colour schemes, how and why to reduce the colours on your page, and how to make your paintings more exciting.

In this session, we’ll strip perspective right back to basics—no complicated grids, vanishing points, or technical tools. Just common sense, a horizon line, and a few simple techniques that really work. I’ll show you how measuring angles can be quick, intuitive, and good enough to capture believable scenes with confidence.

We’ll work through three of the most common challenges in perspective: hills, curves, and verticals. Along the way, we’ll also tackle the frequent pitfalls I see sketchers run into—and how to overcome them with ease.

Here is another time to relax, experiment and try something different!

Like the previous interludes, the scenes here are not about perfection. They're about trying something different - in these interludes we are going to focus on perspective, but in a different way!

In this final session, we’ll bring everything together with three of the most-requested challenges: painting night scenes, capturing boats and water, and creating a scene of your own.

These subjects can seem intimidating, but I’ll show you the practical tricks that make them approachable and fun. You’ll learn how to suggest reflections and ripples without fuss, how to use limited colour for moody nighttime effects, and how to trust your instincts and your style when it comes to picking your own scene and developing it. This is where your sketching starts to feel truly yours.