The Big Draw

As you may know I spent Saturday in St Pancras International as a volunteer for The Big Draw.

I arrived at 9.30am to be kitted out in a fetching TBD t-shirt and name badge and promptly set about setting up for the day. 

Our roles were to include manning the area we had on the Rendezvous level next to the imposing Meeting Place sculpture (by Paul Day), accompanying the families on walking and drawing tours and helping those doing architectural studies within the station. So at 10am we all set off with our lovely new pencils, kindly provided by Derwent and began to sketch en masse. 

During the morning we were given a brief talk by Alastair Lansley, the architect who led the 10 year project of redevelopment at St. Pancras International; which incidentally is a beautiful, vast space which has the ability to catch light and scatter it around the sky blue wrought iron and highlight the masonry quite impressively.

We also accompanied the families on a walking and drawing tour of the station, led by storyboard artist Josh Knowles, who's enthusiasm and knowledge of the station despite only three hours sleep (we later learnt) encouraged the children to view the station with fresh eyes and tell a story of how people use public spaces in very different ways.

Overall it was a tiring but incredibly rewarding day's work, and I shall be doing it all again next year, if they'll have me. Oh and if anyone can make it, they're hosting The Big Picture Party on Monday 27th October at The British Library, fingers crossed I can get the day off and attend. Watch this space.

Photo Information:

Architect Alastair Lansley gives his talk.

Japanese version of Blue Peter interview a participant.

The collection of drawings.

My offering to the collection.

For more pics see my Flickr set.