A couple of years ago, illustrator Jason Polan set out to draw every single person in New York City. Now, Australian illustrator and creative nomad James Gulliver Hancock is drawing all the buildings in New York. He started the blog when he first moved to Brooklyn, as a way of getting to know his surroundings and recording his relationship with his new home.

I’ve started to see all the buildings intersect, all the areas locking together. A lot of the drawings seem to reflect this interlocking of manmade structures, i.e. it’s all connected. I started out wanting to hug all the buildings in some autistic reaction to love, awe, shock… but now they are slowly becoming just friends.” ~ James Gulliver Hancock

With his playful style and mix of drawing tools and techniques, from Sharpie-on-notebook to digital illustration to screenprints, Hancock offers a refreshing lens on the world’s most overexposed city, filling it with the kind of childlike wonder so easy to lose amidst New York’s chronic hurry.

In this talk from Harvest HQ’s excellent HOBBY series, Hancock pulls the curtain on his creative process

The interesting thing about drawing is that it makes you look at objects in more detail. Instead of just passing by a building, you realize that there’s this weird little sign and it says these funny things about what the deli sells.” ~ James Gulliver Hancock

Many of Hancock’s lovely drawings are available as prints on the project site. We’re particularly loving the How New York Works one. (Sorry, no direct link — look in the blog’s right sidebar.)

via Quipsologies