New York
Lexington Avenue meets East 57th Street in one of Manhattan’s most recognisable corners — a tangle of signage, traffic and stacked stone buildings that somehow holds together as one composition.
I ran painting workshops in Times Square a few years ago, and this corner has stayed with me ever since. New York doesn’t give you a quiet view. It gives you noise, signage and energy — and asks you to find the picture inside it anyway.
That’s exactly what this course is about.
Why New York Looks Impossible — and Isn’t
A New York street corner looks like chaos. Signage stacked on signage. Windows running twelve storeys up. Traffic backed up at every light. Pedestrian crossings, scaffolding, street furniture — it’s everything, all at once.
Here is what beginners don’t realise: you are never required to draw all of it.
The skill in a scene like this isn’t accuracy — it’s editing. Deciding what stays (the signage, the big stacked windows, the energy of the crossing) and what goes (the scaffolding, the precise count of every car). The four-stage process gives you the structure to simplify with confidence.
Wobbly lines, loose colour, a slightly skewed perspective — on a corner this busy, none of that reads as a mistake. It reads as New York.
Who This Course Is For
This online watercolour course is for beginners — people who have always wanted to paint but haven’t known where to start.
You don’t need prior experience. You don’t need an expensive set of materials. You need curiosity, a willingness to give it a go, and a subject worth spending time with.
This corner of Manhattan is that subject.
By the end, you’ll have a finished painting — made by your hand, in your own way — and a four-stage method you can carry to any scene you encounter, anywhere in the world.
How We Get There: The Four-Stage Process
This course follows my four-stage painting process — a clear, repeatable method that takes you from blank page to finished artwork, one stage at a time.
Big Shapes
Before a single drop of colour goes down, we work out where everything sits on the page. On a junction this busy, the signage does most of the structural work — the Lexington Avenue sign anchors the whole composition. Using pencil and Tombow brush pen, you’ll map the big shapes with confidence, and learn what to leave out.
Watercolour
Using a tight four-colour palette — transparent orange, cobalt turquoise light, magnesium brown and ultramarine blue — we build the warmth of the stonework against the cool depth of the avenue. Not copying what’s there. Capturing what it feels like.
Tone and Shade
Using Tombow brush pens across four grey values, we build the depth that makes this corner feel three-dimensional — pulling out the stacked windows, deepening the crossings, and adding the darkest accents where the picture needs them most.
Detail
This is where the painting finds its personality. Using a Uniball and fine liners, we add the specific, observed marks that make this corner feel like New York — the signage lettering, the window patterning, the energy of a busy Manhattan street. Line weight does the work of distance: bold up close, quiet further back.
What’s Inside
- 4 step-by-step video lessons
- Full walkthrough of the four-stage painting process
- Stage-by-stage guidance from first sketch to finished artwork
- Materials list — know exactly what you need before you start
- Lifetime access — work at your own pace, revisit any lesson anytime
- Access to the private Artyfactor student community
£49.99
One-off payment · Lifetime access
Ready to Start?
Four lessons. One unmistakable Manhattan corner. Signage, energy, and a quiet confidence in knowing exactly what to leave out.
Not ready to commit? Try the free course first — or browse all courses.