Whenever I drive by the Palm Motor Hotel I get a little surge of home energy.
It looks like motels I remember staying in when visiting Santa Barbara and Los Angeles.
I’ve always loved these Mid-Century Modern signs.

Today I finally was alone and had about 15 minutes before tests at Kaiser and gave sketching the sign a go.  Not much time, mind you — so instead of setting up
I went for it with Heart of Darkness ink which tends to run (I did not know I left
that pen in my bag.) Spontaneous, head on, and not much time.

I thought I could do better with setup and more time.

Then I was out early from the tests and decided to come around and try my hand again.  Other direction, across Interstate, and I had about 45 minutes, or so I thought.
I used setup lines with a grey watercolor pencil and this time reached for Lexi Grey —
duh — I want to be able to dash watercolors later without it bleeding.
Then a guy creeped me out and so I moved on after about 25 minutes.
I am sorry I could not finish the side and could not from memory.

In the second I was more careful about proportions and oddly, think they are off
(squatty body) while the first is much more accurate.  I like the pop of the black ink despite the bleeding of the colors.  I like the spontaneous one best.  This style begs to have bright colors and a crisp line.  Sometimes your first approach is the best approach . . .

Drawn in an Strathmore Mixed Media journal Noodler’s inks,
Grey watercolor pencil, and Daniel Smith watercolors.

I agree to Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial 4.0 International License, which you can learn more about by visiting the site, or,
visit my web page for a more user-friendly summary on my terms.
My images/blog posts may be reposted; please link back to dkatiepowellart.