Conversations with strangers in Spanish

Conversations with strangers in Spanish

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Our Granada Sketching Retreat is officially complete! It was such a wonderful experience, and Julia and I are so grateful for the trust our guests placed in us. They had never sketched outside before, and it was so rewarding to see their confidence and skills grow over the five days of the retreat.

On the first afternoon, we met for an urban sketching session in Bib Rambla, the city's main square, where tourists and granaínos mix freely. It's one of my favourite places to sketch, because it's full of life and colour, and it helps you get oriented in the city.

People do tend to come up to me when I sketch, but I have never spoken to as many people as I did during that session. I did a lot of Spanish practice! But in some ways it was the best thing that could have happened, to help our guests set aside any fear they might have had about sketching in public.

We start with a turn about the square, as if we were ladies in a Jane Austen novel, until we find a spot near the central fountain where we can capture the sun shining on the top levels of the apartments.

Last time I was here, I painted a cute kiosk, but since it's our guests' first time sketching outside, it feels right to challenge myself too. There's a new stand nearby, Carolina Bouquet, that's filled with brightly-coloured flowers and lots of people browsing. Behind the stand are white apartment blocks and beautifully-dense trees, so I pick a wider scene than I usually would. Our workshops in the coming days will focus on sketching loosely and painting white buildings, so this feels like the perfect warm-up scene.

A young woman comes over with four kids, who seem super sweet. I ask the boy closest to me if he likes to paint; his face lights up when he says, "Sí". The Mum says she's always wanted to paint, but now it's too late to start. She's definitely younger than me, so I tell her that I only started painting a few years ago and she has plenty of time to begin. I encourage her to look up the local sketching group online and say that her kids, who've run off to start playing soccer in a corner of the square, would be welcome too. I hope she finds the courage to come to an event soon.

An older woman wearing a leopard-print scarf comes over and asks me if I'm using watercolour. When I nod, she says that she's never tried it but she loves to paint with oils. I tell her I've never tried oils, but that I guess it's faster to paint with watercolour. She looks dubious, but the proof is in the loose sketches we're creating as the sun drifts below the crust of the earth. I'm doing so much chatting that I'm painting more instinctively than I usually would, in some places almost drawing with my paintbrush. It feels light and good.

She asks me if I'm studying at the University and I laugh and tell her I'm in my thirties, but I appreciate the compliment. Then she asks me how old I think she is, and reader, I'm ashamed to say it, but this is the moment when I panic. She's definitely older than me and younger than my grandma, but otherwise I'm at a loss. Each second feels momentous - I do not want to offend this woman. So I hedge and guess late-forties, and it turns out she's 73! My surprise is genuine; my takeaway is that people are bad at estimating other people's ages. May I have this woman's curiosity and grace in my seventies.

Then she asks me the usual questions about how long I've lived in Granada and whether I like it. I show her my recent sketch of Mirador de San Nicolás, and coincidentally she's on her way to do a walking tour of the Albaicín. She's been studying the poetry of Federico García Lorca, one of Granada (and Spain's) most famous poets, who was murdered by the Franco regime during the Spanish Civil War. I tell her I'd love to read his poetry, but need to improve my Spanish a little more first. She tells me to start with his plays, and I make a mental note to have a look next time I'm at the library.

A while later, a Japanese man comes over, points at my sketch, and exclaims, Sugoi! (すごい). Thankfully I remember enough Japanese from high school to know he's saying something like "Wow!", but he also gives me a big smile. Then he asks if he can take a photo of me with my sketch - a little unorthodox, but I guess it's okay since he asked politely. I hope he uses it for good.

After a couple of hours sketching, we go for tapas, eating typical dishes like ensalada de tomate con melva and croquetas so large that you order them individually. The nice thing about having a small group is that I can take them to the same restaurant that I take friends and family to when they visit.

We talk about how when you first sketch outside, you only have a couple of sketches, so there's a lot of pressure to make every single sketch good. Otherwise, it's easy to feel like you're not only bad at sketching, but also at life! But once you've done tens or hundreds of sketches, each sketch is less important because it's a much smaller proportion of the whole. It's easier to focus on enjoying the process, reflect for a moment, and then turn the page to start the next sketch.

We also talk about how good urban sketching is for helping you to get rid of the impulse to make perfect art. At home, you have a lot of control over your environment, but outside there's noise, you're sketching people in motion, the light changes, and people talk to you. But there's freedom in releasing control for a few hours, and letting yourself drift in the currents of the weather and the strangers passing by. My hope is that that's what our guests take away most from this trip.

It was such a pleasure to organise this retreat and be able to share how special my adopted hometown is with our guests. A huge thank you to Julia Henze for her fantastic workshops that helped our guests learn to paint confidently and freely outside (and with beautiful shadows).

We're so proud of ourselves, grateful for all the new connections we've made, and already looking forward to planning the next retreat! If you're interested in joining us in October 2026, sign up for the waitlist for early-bird access and behind-the-scenes info:

Sketches from Granada celebrates every-day moments of connection with strangers, friends and ourselves. I know how easy it is not to be present in your own life, and I hope these sketches inspire you to seek out those moments that are worth savouring. 

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