Not a Haunted House: Temescal Tid Bits

Although my wonky sketch makes it look rather spooky, this is actually a lovely, well-maintained home in the Temescal district of Oakland. I was sitting on the curb sketching at sunset and a woman walked by and said, “Oh, I just sketched that house yesterday!”

We met for our Tuesday evening sketching in Temescal Alley, a historic semi-restored block of tiny shops that was formerly a horse stable. Temescal Alley Barber Shop is an amazing place with old-fashioned everything (except the barbers who are anything but old-fashioned). They were closing so I only had time to draw their door and barber’s pole but really want to go back and draw inside the shop.

Since all the other shops were closed I started drawing the motorcycle outside the barber shop. Then the barber closed up and drove off. So we walked down the street where we spotted the Victorian at the top of the post and sat down to sketch. We finished the evening at Scream, a tiny shop that sells tiny cups of homemade vegan sorbets, where we sat on a bench and shared our sketches.