New Zealand Odyssey: Ex Grey Lynn Borough Council offices, Ponsonby

'New Zealand Odyssey', published in 1989 by Heinemann, was authored by Don Donovan (who did the text and illustrations) and Euan Sarginson, who did the photography and design. In this series of blog posts, I will publish some of my drawings.

One of the gifts of illustration is that you may put in or leave out whatever you fancy. In this case I was so charmed by the shape of the building that I isolated it completely from its background, foreground and everything else. It finished up looking like a fairytale building.

A restaurant when I painted it in 1987, it was originally a borough council office in 1889 with, at the rear, a fire station (that's what the empty belfry is all about). Lots of bricks, different colours; various shapes: triangles, rectangles, parallelograms and arcs - I so enjoyed the work.

Built to last and it has lasted well.

© DON DONOVAN
donovan@ihug.co.nz