James Richards

James Richards is an internationally recognized urban designer, artist, author, and educator. Based in Siesta Key, Florida, his work explores great places and placemaking across the globe. He is the co-founder of Townscape Inc., an urban design and placemaking consultancy, and is a former professor of landscape architecture at the University of Texas at Arlington. His popular Craftsy online sketching tutorial, "Sketching the Energy of Places," has enrolled over 5,000 students, and is now part of The Great Courses series. He is a blog correspondent, Instructor and Advisory Board member for Urban Sketchers, an international non-profit that promotes freehand on-location sketching across disciplines and around the globe.

Jim has visited and drawn great urban places in 45 countries around the world. His work has been widely published, shown in group and solo exhibitions and seen on NBC Nightly News. His watercolor sketches of Cuban sites related to the writer Ernest Hemingway’s life and work was the subject of his solo exhibition at the Nobel Prize-winning author’s home (now a national museum) near Havana during the 2015 Havana Arts Biennial. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects, and a frequent keynote speaker for conferences and symposia. He travels globally to teach sketching and design drawing workshops for students and professionals.