Author Archives: Chandler O'Leary

Island paradise

One of the things I’ve been doing in my little metaphorical lighthouse lately is dream of sunny shores and road trips past. And my favorite place to remember right now is Santa Catalina Island—26 miles off the coast of southern California—which I visited a few years ago while researching my book. The centerpiece of Avalon, the Catalina’s main town, is the Catalina Casino—which is not that kind of casino at all. The building is modeled after the Italian word meaning “gathering place.” Upstairs is a massive ballroom—the largest circular dance floor on earth. In the 1930s and ’40s, famous big-band musicians broadcast live performances here (which you’ll recognize if you’ve ever seen an old vinyl recording with “Live at the Avalon Ballroom” in the title). Hollywood stars made frequent appearances at these events, as Catalina was long a playground for movie stars from the 1920s until the 60s. Downstairs is the Avalon Theatre, the world’s first cinema ever to be wired for sound. (Its acoustically perfect design was copied at Radio City Music Hall in New York.)

Inside the theater and lining the entry portico are a series of breathtaking art deco murals by John Gabriel Beckman (who designed Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood)—those deserve a post all their own, so for now, I’ll stick to the exterior. What I love most about this building is its sheer presence. Not only is it absolutely massive (twelve stories tall!), but its location at the tip of the half-moon harbor makes it the centerpiece of every Avalon view. It’s postcard-perfect in every way.

Which, by the way, is why I had to include it in my new postcard book. There are sixteen different postcard designs in the book, and more than 400 illustrations in my Best Coast book—so that made for quite a lot of hemming and hawing between myself, my editors, and the design team at Sasquatch Books over which images to turn into postcard. But not this one. Thanks to the casino, Catalina was a shoo-in—and quite possibly my favorite illustration in both books.

So I’m mailing copies of this card from my studio right now, but it’s my current dream to get back to Catalina sometime soon (when it’s safe to travel, of course), and mail it with a postmark from Avalon.

Points of light

I wish I could remember where, but long ago I read some author’s opinion that lighthouses were mankind’s greatest invention, because they were entirely selfless in nature. That thought has stuck with me all these years, and it pops into my head every time I draw a lighthouse.

The memory has occurred to me again during this strange time we all find ourselves in, of social distancing and trying to mitigate a worldwide pandemic. Weeks and weeks on end of self-isolation has given me just a glimpse of what it must have been like to be a lighthouse keeper—to spend long stretches of time in solitude, in order to ensure the safety of others.

Except today we can reach out to each other with more than just a blinking light. Thanks both to modern technology and the good old-fashioned post office, we can stay connected to one another, like a constellation of beacons up and down the coast. It’s good to remember that when I start to pine for the “before” time.

One way or another, sooner or later, we’ll find our way through this terrible time. For now we have our proverbial points of light to guide us, and we’re also scanning the horizon for the brighter, more hopeful light of a future vaccine. I’m hoping we can all stay strong and hold fast to our collective lighthouses of social distancing in the meantime, until we can navigate our way to a safe harbor—together.

Greetings from the Best Coast

Greetings from the [Quarantined] Coast! Hoping this finds you safe and well, and staying home to help “flatten the curve” of the virus that is suddenly everywhere at once. Here in Washington we’re sheltering in place—and as fate would have it, today I am celebrating (from home) the release date of my newest book! Greetings from the Best Coast is a companion book of postcards to my popular Best Coast book—a gift for fellow travelers or a whole packet of instant travel souvenirs.

I was hoping to be able to unveil this news in a snazzier fashion (like at one of my many now-cancelled events, thanks to the ‘rona). Still, it feels so great to see this little book in person! The book contains 32 illustrated postcards (2 each of 16 designs) with quintessentially West Coast scenes and hand-lettering. They’re perfect for bringing along on your next road trip to mail souvenirs from the road (or from the comfort of your reading nook), for sending an invitation to join you on your next adventure, or for presenting the whole book as a gift to your favorite travel companion.

Sasquatch Books, as usual, did a beautiful job of creating an appealing package, with a gorgeous hardcover (with illustrated endsheets! My nerdy heart is all aflutter) wrapped around the stack of postcards inside.

Since we are all armchair travelers right now, I am planning to mail these to friends and family around the country—as a fun memento of trips past and in hopes of being able to travel again someday in the future, when we get to the other side of this crisis.

Major thanks to the team at Sasquatch for making these postcards a reality—especially to my amazing editor Hannah Elnan, and the brilliant art director, Anna Goldstein. If you’d like your own copy, you can find it in the shop!

Today’s the day!

Today is the “book birthday” of The Best Coast: A Road Trip Atlas! After nearly three years of work and a solid decade of research, I can’t believe this day is here. I am so excited to share this labor of love with you, and I hope you’ll love it, too. With 99 hand-drawn maps, more than 400 full-color illustrations, and several hundred more illustrated icons, vignettes, and hand-lettered type treatments, it’ll give you plenty to sink your teeth into for your next road trip!

I owe a boatload of thanks to Sasquatch Books for making this book both a reality and a thing of beauty—especially to Anna Goldstein and her design team, and my longtime editor, Hannah Elnan. And thanks also to the indie bookstores and West Coast museums, restaurants, travel boutiques and souvenir shops that have championed this book—thanks to them, I can say not only can you find it “wherever books are sold,” but in all sorts of wonderful places, all up and down the Best Coast!

Happy reading, and happy travels!

UPDATE, March 2020: You can now also find signed copies in my web shop!

Liquid understory

On my last big book research trip up the West Coast, I finally had the chance to visit the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Of course, it was everything it was hyped up to be and more—I loved watching the sea otters at feeding time, being mesmerized by the jellyfish exhibits, even learning about the building’s past as a sardine cannery. But my favorite of all was the kelp forest exhibit. Just sitting there, bathed in blue light and watching beams of sunlight filter down through the “forest” canopy as I sketched, was the most relaxing moment of a sometimes hectic trip. So even though this sketch didn’t directly translate to an illustration in my book, it provided plenty of inspiration and a happy memory jog.

Fields of gold (or pink, or orange…)

Obviously I have a thing for standing in a field carpeted with flowers and busting out the ol’ watercolors—because not only does it crop up (no pun intended) again and again on this blog…

…but it’s also a recurring theme in my new book. The fun part, of course, was traveling to all these flowery places and experiencing them in person for research. The tulip fields of the Skagit Valley were well-traveled ground for me, so I was already familiar with the hybrid nature of the place: half working agricultural region, half tourist attraction.

Then there were the Flower Fields of the southern California coast: while this ranunculus haven still sells seeds and starts to gardeners, the place has become a full-on tourist trap, complete with ticketed admission and concession stands (it’s still totally worth it; the fields are stunning).

My favorite, however, were the wild California poppy fields of the Antelope Valley. Visiting this place took both planning and luck, because no tourist trap could make the valley bloom on schedule. In fact, it took me many attempts, over years’ worth of SoCal road trips, to see the poppies in person, thanks to a seven-year drought that made the delicate desert landscape inhospitable to flower blooms.

When I finally made it at the right time, under the right conditions, the experience was nothing short of magical. It made every previous, failed attempt worth the time and effort, and had me plotting future trips on the spot. It really drove home (apparently my brain churns out puns involuntarily, sorry) the fact that it’s not enough, for me, to know a place exists before I feel I can write about it. I have to experience it for myself, see it with my own eyes, and use my hands to commit it to paper with pen and paint, if at all possible. It’s an enormous privilege to be able to do this—and sharing that moment and others like it (or at least attempting to) is what creating this book was all about. I can only hope a tiny glimmer of that comes through onto the page—and that it inspires my readers to go to these places, so they can experience the real thing for themselves.

Beachcomber’s sketchbook

Just over a year ago, the Tailor and I met a couple of good friends for a long weekend on the Oregon Coast. Our friends live in San Francisco, so Lincoln City was almost exactly the midpoint between us. And besides, we had an ulterior motive: we wanted to search the beaches for hidden treasure.

Well, we didn’t end up finding much on the beach beyond pretty agate pebbles and a few shells, but the time spent catching up with friends, basking in the views, and filling sketchbooks was priceless.

You’re gonna need a bigger boat

Towards the end of the design process for my new book, the design team at Sasquatch Books and I were putting together all the odds and ends that make up the cover, both inside and out (you’ll find a behind-the-scenes look at the front cover on my studio blog). One of the last elements to fall into place was my author “photo.” Well, if you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, you’ll know that I don’t really do photo selfies—so initially I offered them the standard illustrated self-portrait that I use everywhere, including on my about page.

And then I stopped in my tracks, because I remembered one other selfie I’d done in my sketchbook, and had never shown anyone. I drew it the same day I visited Sharky’s, out on the Pacific Coast. I emailed my editor, and said something to the effect of, “Actually, I do have one other image…but it’s weird. How do you feel about weird?”

Well, I’m happy to report that they thought weird was good, because it made the cut, and it’s pretty much exactly my personality, in a nutshell. So now every time I flip to the end of the book, I’ll have a good chuckle over this—who says author headshots have to be serious?

The Best Coast

While I’ve hinted at this several times on social media, and even shown some snippets of my process along the way, mostly I’ve been sitting on my hands lately, trying my best to keep mum while I wait for time to tick by. And now the waiting is almost over, and it’s time for the big reveal of my new book!

At long last, The Best Coast: A Road Trip Atlas is almost here! This book—an entirely illustrated travel guide to the West Coast—has been a labor of love for me, spanning more than two years of work on the book itself and a solid decade of research, road trips and travel sketching. And now we’re just a little over a month away from the publication date on April 9!

I’ll be sharing a lot more here and over at my studio blog (after today, there’ll be different content in each place) in the days and weeks to come: behind-the-scenes process images, stories and sketches behind the locations featured in the book, a social media photo contest (with prizes!), and much more. And if you’re local, we’ll be throwing the official launch party right here in Tacoma:

Best Coast launch party
Wednesday, April 10, 2019
7 pm, free!
King’s Books
218 St. Helens Ave, Tacoma, WA

In the meantime, you can learn more about the book and preorder your copy on my book page! Many thanks to the team at Sasquatch Books for making this book—a dream of mine for years now—a reality! Looking forward to sharing more with you soon.

P.S. Because people always ask me, yes, preordering—as opposed to waiting until the book comes out—makes a huge difference. Books with strong preorder sales get better promotion from both the publisher and retailers, get a better ranking on huge sites like Amazon (and thus better exposure), and reach a wider audience of both customers and press outlets. So every preorder counts, and is like an extra boost of support, both for me and for your favorite retailer.

Rec-ommended

This post is part of an ongoing series called 66 Fridays, which explores the wonders of old Route 66. Click on the preceding “66 Fridays” link to view all posts in the series, or visit the initial overview post here.

This beauty has stood proud over Sunset Boulevard since 1924, once advertising a bowling alley and billiards parlor. It was one of the very first mixed-use (residential and commercial) spaces in Los Angeles, but like so many other historic landmarks, it fell into disrepair over time.

Fortunately, it was declared a Los Angeles Historical Cultural Monument in 1998, and carefully restored in the intervening years. The building was recently sold again, but thanks to its status, the Jensen’s bowler will continue throwing strike after strike, on into the future.