10 Whimsical Watercolors of Boldly Impossible Architecture

Mattias Adolfsson animates buildings in amazing ways with the stroke of a pen, first drafted in pencil, followed by splashes of mellow color that slowly bring them to life.

He sells prints (and some originals) of his work on Etsy, features examples on Behance, and has recently released a book compiling images of choice examples, from stomping architectural monstrosities to improbably tall and thin structures as well as buildings that fly, float, spin in the air or even soar through space.

The subjects, as you can see, range but tend to focus on built environments with a Steampunk-like nostalgia for vintage styles and historic decor, splicing bits and pieces with Dutch, German, Gothic, Renaissance, Roman and Greek roots (and with enviably reckless abandon).

If you have read anything by China Mieville, you may be reminded of his work with words in these artistic renderings – particularly this train-turned-architecture analogous to the self-perpetuating, track-laying, city-on-rails from Iron Council.

Exploded in 3D: Architectural Perspective Projections [Pics]

Isometric, dimetric, trimetric and oblique axonometric … it sounds like a slew of geometrical gibberish, but these kinds of representations are some of the richest ways to show off key aspects of a work of architecture (or furniture or industrial designs, for that matter).

Dwelling in 3D: 10 Photo-Realistic Exterior Home Renderings

There is something beautiful about a sketch that goes beyond personal expression. Sketches are intentionally loose, sometimes rough and almost invariably incomplete. Like words in a book, they leave space for the viewer to visualize, adding their own details and infilling image gaps in color, shape and form with their individual imaginations.