Bike & Sketching Tour / ‘Hythe Bay Spectacular’ - 22 June 2019

Folkestone Triennial Public Art / Small things matter… Photo Credit: B Hamilton, AIA

This year’s Bike & Sketching Tour started out – obscurely enough – in Pluckley and ended up – more spectacularly – at Folkestone Harbour, with a large swathe of Kent countryside and Romney Marsh in between.  

But the selling point of our tour guide – Ben O’Looney, RIBA – is to treat the inauspicious and the well-known with equal respect and admiration, and thereby draw our attention to history, context, materials and details that might otherwise be ignored. 

So – starting from the rustic design of the Pluckley train station (it actually has its own minor role in architectural history), the tour easily progressed to multiple splendours - ecclesiastical, domestic, local, militaristic and idiosyncratic... On an AIA Bike Trip anything is possible; everything is educational…

Highlights included inter alia (and in no particular order): 

Mediaeval and renaissance English architecture; materials and geology of Hythe Bay and SE England; Georgian architecture; military defences; Saga Group Headquarters (high tech/low energy project – Hopkins); public art (Folkestone Triennial); Folkestone Harbour Railway Station; Rocksalt Restaurant/Bar (Guy Holloway Architects).

It is not all that easy to concentrate on buildings and bike riding at the same time, so the tour’s photo history is a bit hit and miss.  Still the photos (and sketch) hint at the day’s scope.

Sketching….

Sketch Credit: B O’Looney, RIBA

Looking at things ecclesiastical… 

Looking in more detail…

Looking at things domestic, local, militaristic, idiosyncratic...

Just looking…

Team Building…

The AIA Bike Trips are prone to camaraderie and team building.  There was – of course – some inevitable adversity (on the map that track looked viable? / 2 flat tires in one day?).   It was a long day, but a good one worth 6 Continuing Education Credits, earned by total immersion!

A long, often beautiful day… Photo Credit: B Hamilton, AIA

Written by: Lorraine D King, AIA

Photo Credits: B Hamilton, AIA / B Spring, AIA / A Pohl, AIA / E Fitzpatrick, AIA / L King, AIA