# Create Your Scribble Sanctuary Sketchbook Retreat with Artist Sophie McPike in France

Soak in the morning light, fill your pencil case with your favorite materials, and join artist Sophie McPike for a magical retreat and travel journal sketchbook adventure in the stunning Dordogne region of France. Stay at a historic estate with spacious indoor studios, sunny terraces, and peaceful gardens filled with birdsong and flowers that inspire both quiet sketching and relaxed conversations over shared meals. Turn real-world sights into mixed-media sketchbook pages bursting with watercolor, markers, collected bits and bobs, and fearless imagination. Daily sessions include warm-up mark making, fast on-location sketching, mixed-media layering, color mixing, simple value planning, water control, and idea-getting strategies that blend observation and experimentation. Paint indoors and outdoors from real-life references, write your thoughts and experiences, and enjoy step-by-step demos, open Q&A, gentle feedback, and a safe, joy-filled space that fuels fearless, playful self-expression and leaves all levels feeling curiously silly and unmistakably personal in their work long after the retreat ends.

## Details

- **Dates:** June 13 - 20, 2026
- **Location:** Eymet, Dordogne, France
- **Starting Price:** $4,550
- **Category:** Painting

## Program

### Create Your Scribble Sanctuary Sketchbook Retreat
Pack your sketchbook, grab your messiest markers, and come play in the glorious French countryside with Sophie McPike! Spend eight color-soaked days drawing crooked rooftops, painting vegetables, and collaging bits of your day straight into your pages. You’ll build a memory-filled travel sketchbook through experimentation, exploration, play, mess, and the occasional refined piece. One day it’s continuous-line villages, the next it’s still-life fruit chaos and pink skies. Sketch from memory, use photos from your art trips, invent new ways of drawing trees, and everything will be beautiful because it came from you!!! This retreat is for anyone: beginners, dabblers, seasoned scribblers, and recovering perfectionists.Visit the medieval alleys of Issigeac, the hilltop drama of Beynac-et-Cazenac, and the bustling Eymet market. One moment you’re sketching higgelty-piggelty rooftops, and the next you’re gluing fruit stickers into a collage about your breakfast. Collect colors, photos, and memories, then take them and turn them into layered, expressive spreads that make no sense and all the sense at once to document your own authentic experience.Sophie will be right there with prompts, demos, fun ideas, and nonstop creative energy, cheering you on as you let go of “getting it right” and make work that feels totally like you! Jump into continuous line drawings, bold color blocking, sketchbook storytelling, collage experiments, and wild layouts that happily ignore every rule. The goal isn’t a perfect sketchbook but to create a safe, joy-filled space (inside yourself and on the page) for weird and wonderful decisions, happy accidents, big creative growth, and tons of compassion.Topics you will explore include:Playing with unconventional tools, wild palettes, and rule-breaking layouts just for funExperimenting freely in a safe zone where every decision is celebratedSketching wobbly towers, magic moments at the market, and quick floralsMixing watercolor, markers, scribbles, and words into pages...and many more!Your accommodation will be in an elegant historic estate from the Napoleonic era, set amidst vibrant gardens, secluded woodlands, a natural pond, and a heated pool. Delight in Dordogne’s culinary heritage with daily chef-prepared meals, and savor the local wines through a cheese and wine-tasting experience.

### Day 1: Arrival
Catch the 3:30 PM shuttle from Bergerac train station to your retreat venue, a stunning 25-acre historic estate in the heart of Dordogne. Upon arrival, settle into your cozy accommodations, take a moment to unwind, and meet Sophie McPike, your instructor for the week. Start your experience with a guided tour of the estate, showcasing its charming communal spaces, beautifully landscaped gardens, sunlit terraces, a heated swimming pool, serene woodlands, and a tranquil pond. The day concludes with a warm welcome dinner featuring exquisite French cuisine and fine wine, setting the tone for an inspiring and unforgettable week ahead.

### Day 2: Art at the venue
Wake up with the sun and head to the garden for a colorful breakfast. Sip your drink, feel the breeze, and smile at what’s ahead. After breakfast, check in with the venue host. Your sketchbook adventure begins now!Crack open that sketchbook and dive straight into playful swatching and mark-making. Along with Sophie, you'll create the opening spread of your new sketchbook. Then, you will start filling in some pages as you get to know your new sketchbook and how it interacts with your materials. Sophie will show you how to swatch your paint in interesting ways, mix watercolor with markers, how to layer boldly, scribble freely, and test every material like you’re discovering it for the first time. Explore wet-on-wet, dry brush, and anything in between. You’ll use Sophie’s workbook to complete a set of mini creative prompts.These warm-up tasks will get your hand moving, your colors flowing, and your pages buzzing with energy. Create color charts, doodle shapes, and play with opacity and transparency. Make a mess and love every bit of it!Pause for a fresh, nourishing lunch. Eat well, rest your hand, and let the morning swirl through your mind while you reset.In the afternoon, bring your sketchbook and workbook for a walk around the venue. Wander through gardens, paths, and quiet corners. You will paint and draw from life using observation and intuition. Sketch trees, plants, stones, windows, or whatever pulls your attention! Sophie will teach you how to look with intention and gather inspiration. Look at how things lean, twist, and bend. Capture that movement with swooping shapes and interesting lines. Use the workbook to reflect, explore composition, or jot down thoughts as you work.As the afternoon slows, keep sketching if you’re still in flow or stretch out somewhere quiet. When evening rolls in, gather for a relaxed dinner with delicious food and warm conversation.

### Day 3: Art trip to Issigeac
Step into your morning with color on your mind. After breakfast and a warm drink, grab your sketchbook and head out with Sophie to Issigeac. Walk twisting alleyways and sunlit corners, snapping quick photos of crooked rooftops, chipped doors, and anything that pulls you in. Jot notes, sketch fast impressions, and fill pages with messy charm. Pause near the church or at a café. Choose a wild color for a window just because it feels right. Sketch a crooked sign, a lace curtain, and a bicycle leaning too far. Use your workbook along the way for ideas and composition experiments.Return to the venue for a light lunch and a bit of rest. In the afternoon, continue the story of Issigeac with guided exercises like continuous-line village sketches, simplified color palettes, and quick vignettes from memory. Compare your reference photos and notice what changed or surprised you. Collage any paper bits, leaves, or ephemera you collected straight onto the page. Trust your instincts!Finish the day with a three-course dinner full of local flavor and the quiet satisfaction of pages well-loved and stories still unfolding.

### Day 4: Art at the venue
Tuck into a cozy breakfast and feel your sketchbook nudging you from the corner of the table. Sophie leads a vibrant morning of exploration where you return to unfinished spreads or start something totally new. Mix colors just to see what happens. Add textures, small moments, secret details, margin notes, color swatches, tiny maps, floating captions, or fragments of conversations. Grab your workbook and dive into saved prompts or mash them into something unexpected.Pause midday for a simple, delicious lunch and a bit of laughter before a creative shake-up in the gardens. You will play a collaborative art game where sketchbooks are passed around the group. Scribble what you see, pass it on, add to the next page with fast lines, loud colors, weird shapes, and happy accidents. It will be messy and brilliant and exactly what you did not know you needed!Slow the pace again. Look through the week’s photos and choose the ones that still tug at you. Fill open pages with that energy or work on more finished pieces. As the sky turns golden, enjoy a three-course dinner full of local flavor. Share your favorite spreads and enjoy the wonky, paint-covered magic of living on paper.In the evening, Sophie will take you all outside, and by using only the light of the moon and stars, you will do some plein air painting in the dark of the night. What happens when you paint something that you can barely see in front of you? Hopefully something loose, wonky and wonderfully unexpected! Oops, you used orange for the tree instead of using green? We love it!

### Day 5: Trip to Beynac-et-Cazenac
Fuel up with a warm breakfast at the venue and gather your sketchbook and favorite tools. Head out with Sophie to the hilltop village of Beynac-et-Cazenac, where stone houses climb the hillside and flower-filled windows lean into the sky. Walk the winding streets and let the atmosphere guide a free journaling session. Move into sketching or take reference photos and quick visual notes. Sketch on location or simply observe and collect, noticing rooftops, shifting stonework, and the drama of the village leaning into the hillside.Break for a light lunch in the village and take a quiet moment to rest. In the afternoon, sit together for a longer plein-air session and develop a more intentional landscape piece. Start with thumbnails and build a full spread using watercolor or your preferred medium. Push color if it feels right and move from simple lines into deeper composition, creating a page that holds structure and feeling.Return to the estate in the early evening and enjoy a relaxed three-course dinner. Share what you captured and reflect on the day!

### Day 6: Trip to the French market
Wake up with your sketchbook calling and your favorite pens already waiting. Enjoy a warm breakfast at the venue and the quiet buzz of the day beginning. Walk with Sophie to the Eymet market for a gentle stroll through winding streets and into a colorful world of fruit stands, handwritten signs, and flower buckets. Gather visual references and materials. Snap photos, sketch on the spot, and pick up labels and bits to collage later. Keep it quick and loose, capturing movement and energy without chasing perfection.Return to the venue for a light lunch and a short rest before heading into the studio. In the afternoon, bring out your collected items and begin a still life session. Work from photos or memory. Draw one object repeatedly or mix several into a full spread. Play with composition and scale. Experiment freely or simply record what feels comfy. Sophie will be nearby to answer questions and demo anything you need. Follow your own flow, continue older pages, or dive into something completely new.Finish the day with a relaxed three-course dinner. Share your work, talk about your favorite finds, and enjoy the feeling of creating something entirely your own.

### Day 7: Art at the venue
Start the day with your favorite drink in one hand and a sketchbook in the other. Enjoy a warm breakfast at the venue, then settle into the studio for a relaxed final day of making. Sophie will guide an open session where you return to your favorite materials and themes. Revisit unfinished pages or begin something new. Sketch from memory, feeling, or lingering fragments. Work small or big. Create freely or think deeply. You will also complete a journal-style creative task, such as a short note, comic, or shareable sketch, exchanged with someone or left anonymously.Pause for lunch at the venue and let the rhythm of the day unfold slowly.In the afternoon, prepare a mini-exhibition! Choose favorite pages and pieces, hang them with twine or clips, spread sketchbooks across tables, or share with a small talk! Walk through the work together, notice what you loved making, and celebrate what surprised you! Sophie will lead a closing circle to reflect on what filled your pages and what you want to carry home.Finish with a shared dinner and raise a glass to the week you just lived and painted! Your sketchbook will leave with you, still open and still growing!

### Day 8: Departure
Enjoy a final breakfast with Sophie and your fellow artists before it's time to part ways. Departing at 9:00 AM, you'll head to Gare Bergerac train station, arriving around 9:45 AM. As you journey home, you'll carry with you a heart full of inspiration and unforgettable memories.

## Instructors

- **Sophie McPike** - Artist and art educator

## Accommodation

### Historic countryside estate

### Shared standard room

### Shared superior room

### Single standard room

### Single superior room

## Book This Retreat

Visit [https://uptrek.com/retreat/create-scribble-sanctuary-sketchbook-retreat-artist-sophie-mcpike-france](https://uptrek.com/retreat/create-scribble-sanctuary-sketchbook-retreat-artist-sophie-mcpike-france) to make a reservation.

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