Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

If America since Jan 2025 hasn’t broken your heart, you haven’t loved her enough.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

The words do not have to be perfect.

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Everybody saw this coming.

Oppose, oppose, oppose. do not congratulate. this is not business as usual.

Not all heroes wear capes.

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. do not touch it.”

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

You cannot shame the shameless.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

Beware of advice from anyone for whom Democrats are “they” and not “we.”

Jack Smith: “Why did you start campaigning in the middle of my investigation?!”

President Musk and Trump are both poorly raised, coddled 8 year old boys.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

You are here: Home / Photo Blogging / On The Road / Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings!

Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings!

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On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.

From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.

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Let’s try this again!

The first 14 comments were from last Saturday before the post was inexplicably pulled.  Please give a warm welcome to Chip Daniels who is sharing his talent with us today.

~WaterGirl

My name is Chip Daniels. I am mostly a lurker here at BJ but wanted to share my hobby of watercolors with you all.

I am an architect living and working in downtown Los Angeles and enjoy creating drawings and paintings of imaginary fantasy buildings, in a Steampunk style.

Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings! 8
Los Angeles

These are fantasy buildings, in some imagined alternate timeline set in the City of Angels, where simple industrial facilities are elevated by architecture into something grand and sacred.

 

I hope you enjoy!

Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings! 7
Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings! 6
Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings! 5
Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings! 4
Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings! 3
Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings! 2
Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings! 1
Chip Daniels – Watercolor Paintings!

Reader Interactions

57Comments

  3. 3.

    sab

    Those are quite lovely, but rather archtectural.

    There is, or used to be a lot of good painting going on in not-art circles.

  4. 4.

    germy

    These are fantasy buildings, in some imagined alternate timeline set in the City of Angels, where simple industrial facilities are elevated by architecture into something grand and sacred.

    I admit I’ve become somewhat of a crank on that subject.  I spent 20 years living in a plain exurb with boxy “modernist” strip malls.  The city hall was a cinder block box.  Since then we’ve moved to a city with more history, and I like looking out my window and seeing the various fancy architectural details on my neighbors’ houses.

    When I lived in the exurb I always fantasized about an alternative timeline where people actually took pride in their buildings.

    I like your watercolors, they remind me of Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks.

  7. 7.

    Chip Daniels

    @germy:

    What’s really wonderful is that period between the two world wars when architects still had that romantic notion of making buildings heroic and beautiful, but were using images of the New technology like steam locomotives and “aeroplanes”.

    I’m imagining a world where buildings like generator stations are imbued with a sense of drama and wonder.

  10. 10.

    germy

    @Chip Daniels:

    There’s an old trolley station in my town that’s now used as a visitor’s center and mini-museum.  It’s gorgeous.  Built in the 19th century.

    I think the advantage the 20th century modernists had was their buildings could be thrown up cheaply. No need to pay sculptors and masons to create beauty.

  12. 12.

    Big Picture Pathologist

    Being related to two architects who were grounded in ‘practical’ projects, I very much enjoy seeing those in the field that undertake these flights of fancy.

    I don’t know anything about the Unreal Engine/CAD/etc., but I’d bet some software developer would gladly incorporate your amazing designs into some game’s background if you ever chose to turn these ideas into ones and zeros.

    ETA: Any way one can obtain/buy larger images of these? I’d personally be willing to buy prints or high-res scans

  13. 13.

    Ohio Mom

    @germy: The other day we had reason to drive through an exurban shopping strip, all big boxes and chains, in an area that was farms twenty-five years ago.

    We passed one failed chain restaurant, a building I remembered watching go up, being torn down. Cheap and temporary is the motto.

    So wasteful! And certainly no role for craftsmanship.

    Anyway, Chip’s drawings also remind me of DaVinci’s notebooks. They demand the viewer slow down and examine them.

  14. 14.

    Lynn Dee

    These are so nice. The mix of architectural-type drawing and watercolor is gorgeous.

    Have you done anything with Angels Flight? At least one of the above reminds me of that location although not the car itself.

    Anyway, I love these. Do you have a website?

  20. 20.

    germy

    These are fantasy buildings, in some imagined alternate timeline set in the City of Angels, where simple industrial facilities are elevated by architecture into something grand and sacred.

    That timeline exists sometimes in cinema.  I remember taking my kids to see The Borrowers back in 1997, and the city of that film is full of retro architecture, interior and exterior.  There’s even blimps in the sky.

    I notice the same thing in TV shows.  Like a police dept. or other government building will be a gorgeous, wood-paneled interior with subtle lighting, rather than a cement block lit with florescent lights.  TV and movie characters often live in quaint bungalows in tree lined, walkable neighborhoods.  I think set designers don’t like the ugliness of the real world we inhabit.

  21. 21.

    AJ

    Beautiful, subtle, thoughtful, evocative!

    Ty so much for these. Would love to explore a game world city in this style.

  26. 26.

    Grumpy Old Railroader

    Textures and shading are absolutely awesome. I keep going back to Electro Generating Station #3 trying to figure out how you did the wall texture.

    You have inspired me to try an entirely different direction in my own watercolors. Thanks so much.

  31. 31.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @germy:

    The Garden of Allah was a thing of beauty in West Hollywood, California before it was demolished (like so many things of beauty) in the late 1950s.

    They built a bank on the property and the bank had a museum devoted to the Garden of Allah.  Through changes in ownership the museum and it’s scale model of the Garden of Allah ended up as a strip mall.  I’m not sure who has it, but the scale model still exists(it even has lights!).  The current owner of the property wants to tear down the bank/strip mall and redevelop it.  The LA Conservancy is fighting that due to the bank building’s unique architecture.  You can find a great deal more about the Garden of Allah and other LA history at the(very long) Noirish LA thread over at skyscraper.com.  You might even run into BillinGlendaleCA over there.

  36. 36.

    WaterGirl

    @Chip Daniels: Chip, if you have a website, you can add your website or your instagram page on Balloon Juice so that people can just click your nym on BJ and go directly to your site.

    You just have to enter the URL in the same area where you enter your nym and your email address, and then your nym will be clickable.

  40. 40.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @WaterGirl:

    Might be a good time to remind people who have put Balloon Juice in that “Website” field that they can remove it. (They might have to be reapproved afterwards, I guess.)

  41. 41.

    debbie

    Beautiful structures! I especially like the subtle color washes. I’m seeing that part of the 19th century when the possibilities of mechanization were seen as a good and hopeful thing.

  42. 42.

    Brachiator

    @Chip Daniels:

    The Bradbury also has a starring role in Blade Runner which is a constant source of delight and inspiration to me.

    The Bradbury Building was also featured in the great Outer Limits episode “Demon With A Glass Hand.”

    I did not know that this was a real building. One day a friend took me to lunch in the Building. Blew my mind.

    I think the Million Dollar Theater, across the street, also appeared in Bladerunner. There are a number of other buildings in downtown LA that I think might be interesting.

    Great selections from your work. Thanks very much for sharing.

    A lot of residential and commercial construction in Southern California is modular and blandly functional. Do you find that frustrating?

  47. 47.

    RSA

    How cool and evocative. Thanks. I’m reminded of an urban fantasy series of books by Genevieve Cogman, The Invisible Library. They’re set mainly in London, aside from a few fantastical locations, if I remember correctly, but the Library is actually a sort of nexus between alternate universes, with librarians passing between them.  The setting in the first novel is something like a modern steampunk London, which I imagine to look something like these images.

  48. 48.

    One of the Many Jens

    These are lovely, thank you for sharing them! Not to mention aspirational and inspirational … I verge on the terrible when it comes to drawing/painting cityscapes at various scales, but you have my fingers itching to have another go!

  51. 51.

    J R in WV

    Very nice work. We love architecture, the more off-beat the better… this suits just fine as far as detail work. Now we need to see the giant building with dirigible mooring at the 90 floor level, with this art-punk style all the way up. Elevators, deck trim, etc.

    I’ve always wondered why they didn’t use a blend of hydrogen and helium in the airships, not quite as much lift, way less explosive tho. Heat it up a little, up you go…

  52. 52.

    Chip Daniels

    @Big Picture Pathologist:

    I’m very flattered by the request to purchase my work!

    I have no interest in going into business but would delighted to send at no cost a high res scan suitable to be printed at your end and framed.

    Contact me at Instagram and indicate which one you would like.

  56. 56.

    Virginia

    Architectural art is just so cool.  I am an artist and have had several architects in some art classes I have taken.  Particularly watercolor.  Everyone of them has has such talent.

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