HAND-DRAWN SKETCH DEPICTING SUFFOLK VILLAGE ELEMENTS

I have always loved creating personalised cards and gifts rather than buying mass-produced commercial products. There is something far more meaningful about creating something by hand — however simple — that reflects people, places and memories.

This was a quick hand-drawn card I recently sketched, inspired by elements of my village and the neighbouring village in Suffolk. It includes a few familiar landmarks, roads, landscape edges, woodland, agricultural fields and fragments of settlement character that help define the identity of the area. It is certainly not intended to be accurate, technical or to scale, but rather an expressive interpretation of place and spatial relationships.

Perhaps this comes from the Town Planner in me. Even informal sketches often become exercises in observing how places connect — the relationship between landscape, movement, settlement, landmarks and green space.

In an increasingly digital world, I still think there is enormous value in hand drawing. Quick sketches allow ideas, narratives and observations to emerge freely in a way that often feels more immediate and personal than highly polished graphics. They capture character, atmosphere and memory as much as physical form.

I also find that creating things by hand encourages us to slow down and observe the places we live in more carefully — something that is becoming increasingly important as landscapes and settlements continue to change around us.

Sometimes the simplest sketches tell the most meaningful stories about place. Do you do something similar?