How do you keep record of the places you’ve traveled to or lived in? Do you store photos on your hard drive or the cloud and pull them out to look at them from time to time? Joe Secco turned his experiences in Palestine into a non-fiction graphic novel. Others like artists Maria Rivans and Andrei Autumn turn them into art.

After years of traveling and experimenting with different ways of documenting my travels, I’ve found that a combination of many media works best for me.

I use a combination of travel sketches, comics, illustrations and collages to keep my memories of a place safe.

Comics

Comics travel Korea

I enjoy using comics and caricatures to save funny conversations, funny observations, striking faces etc. on paper. I think comics work really well in capturing simple, hilarious exchanges between two people next to me on the bus, for example. I remember Adrian Tomine’s New York Sketches 2004 as a wonderful example of what I want to do with my portraits of people I see on the streets and the streetscape in a new place.

Comics are also great to quickly save dialogue. When the couple at the table next door are having the most delicious conversation you can overhear, a quick comic is great to capture that. I always carry a small palm-sized sketchpad with me for such emergencies.

Travel Sketches & Illustrations

Journal blog sketh

I feel travel sketches of places, landscapes, buildings, interesting things are more in-the-moment than photographs are. You’ll probably think me weird if I say that I actually prefer sketching a scene to taking photos of it. In the act of sketching, I’m using all my powers of observation. I’m noticing details that I may not notice when I use my camera.

For ladies who enjoy sketching, I highly recommend carrying a sketchbook in your suitcase. You could fill in the sketches with watercolors, color pencils or markers, as this blogger does. Sometimes I like to leave my sketches black and white and simply ink them, when I don’t want the color to interfere with the scene. Here are some beautiful examples of travel sketchbooks and illustrations.

Collages

I also really like this idea of a collage of sketches and penciled illustrations with notes. Of course, it is also possible to create collages with photos and memorabilia.

All you really need for travel sketching is interest, a love of travel, a love of sketching and some simple gear. Since you want to travel light, look for sketchbooks that are not too big. Look for strong binding and quality sketch paper like the Moleskine pocket notebooks. This one has pockets in the flap where you can save scraps of notes.

A sketchbook with a sturdy cover can also double as support if you’re drawing with the sketchbook on your lap.

Travel Sketching Kit

I personally carry two sketchbooks. One is around 5.5 inches on its longest side. Another is large, around 9 by 12 inches, which I always keep in my suitcase for larger illustrations or drawings that I want to enlarge.

I also carry a mixed grade graphite pencil set, eraser and sharpener. A set of 2B, 4B and 6B is enough to sketch on most mediums. Color pencils also make a good addition for quick coloring of scenes. I also carry a thin liner pen (sketch pen and fountain pen) for filling in details and drawing outlines.

When buying watercolors, look for compact sets that also have compact mixing palettes. You might want to carry a set of oil pastels or charcoal sticks depending on your choice of medium.

You can also find a nice sketch kit bag or these lovely little journal bandoliers to carry your art supplies with you without misplacing anything.

Travel Sketching

Once you’ve got into the habit of sketching your travels, you’ll find you never want to take another photo again. You’ll get closer to your subject, spend more time in a location letting the atmosphere soak in while you sketch, and maybe strike up a friendship with people who look over your shoulder to see what you’re doing.

When your travels are over, you can bind all the various mediums into a single scrapbook or collect them all in a single folder. Now that’s a better travelogue than a photo album, isn’t it?

Do you have stories of drawn and illustrated travelogues that you care to share below?

Preserving memories of golden moments from holidays exactly as you experienced them is not easy. Photographs carry some of the essence of a moment. But not all. Videos can capture a moment visually, but they don’t have the same kind of immediacy as old-fashioned scrapbooks.

I like something tangible, something that I can feel and pick up and see whenever I want to refresh my memory. Something with a narrative, and many links to the past that I can pore over for hours and recall warm memories.

Memories and Objects

Bukhansan National Park

And often my memories are attached with some object I picked up when traveling -for example, a sketch gifted by a South Korean acquaintance of a beautiful 600 year old temple in the Mt. Bukhansan National Park near Seoul. Whenever I look at the sketch, it immediately brings back the scent of the incense, the sounds of the forests during the 2-hour meditation sitting on the porch of the temple. This sketch was far more intimate and evocative than a photograph, I think, and I immediately added it to my scrapbook collage, with some notes and photos taken at the temple.

I think a collage is a fantastic way of preserving the golden moments of your holiday. If you haven’t made one before, I strongly encourage you to do so.

When done well, collages can even become works of art that are not just jumbles of photos. I want to share with you some ideas on how you can make a travel collage.

Travel Collage Ideas

Scrapbook collage

Scrapbook Travel

Browse Pinterest for ideas and you’ll be amazed at what some creative people have done with their travel scraps and bits. You could make it as spare or as full of items as possible. I really like this lovely way of saving the route of your journey on a map, embellished with objects that possibly make sense to no one else but you. But the whole has a pleasing effect that even strangers will pause and wonder at.

I personally like to save as much of my trip as I can. I save receipts, tickets, underground railway passes, maps, flight tickets, baggage tags, bookmarks, pamphlets along with photos and anything else that reminds me of the place I visited. This could get crowded. Here you can see one way of scrapbooking. It may or may not work for you.

You may prefer something prettier like this.

Enlarged, framed memorabilia

Martha Stewart offers an idea to turn your travel memorabilia into framed pop art. You could scan a ticket, maybe a currency note, a flight ticket, the scan of your visa or passport etc. Martha Stewart suggests candy wrappers, food labels, menus etc.

Digital collages

Collage Monuments

I personally prefer old-fashioned collages for their character. But many people prefer digital collages. They’re great because you don’t have to worry about your scrapbook getting wet in a flood, burned in a fire, lost when you move home. If you have thousands of photos you want to preserve, you won’t have to rent storage to keep them. You can make digital collages with many free and premium tools online.

I hope this post will inspire some readers to create collages. If you do make something you’re proud of, feel free to share below!