Bodiam Castle in the middle of its moatFour walls in a ring with a tower at each corner and at the gate, all topped by battlements. East Sussex, England.
Belém Tower behind its bastionA four-story square tower rising behind a lower bastion wall, on the bank of the Tagus in Lisbon.
Big Ben's clock tower with one round clock faceA tall square shaft, a clock circle near the top and a pointed roof. The clock has four faces. London.
The CN Tower as a needle with one ringA thin tapering line, a ring-shaped pod most of the way up and a spike above it. Toronto, completed in 1976.
The Eiffel Tower as a tall letter ATwo legs curving in to a point, with three cross bars: the tower has three levels for visitors. Paris.
The Giralda, a bell tower that began as a minaretA tall square shaft with patterned panels and a belfry in stages on top. It is Seville Cathedral's bell tower.
The Kuwait Towers: three thin spikes by the seaThree thin towers in Kuwait City. The main one carries two spheres: draw them as balls threaded on a needle.
Pisa's leaning campanile in stacked ringsThe Leaning Tower of Pisa is the bell tower of Pisa Cathedral, tipped nearly four degrees. Stack ring on ring.
Show all 72 buildings (65 more)
Towers, continued
The Qutb Minar in five tapering storiesA tall tapering cylinder in five stories of red and gray sandstone, with a ring between each. Delhi.
The Space Needle with its saucer on topLegs pinched in at the waist like an hourglass, and a deck shaped like a flying saucer on top. Seattle.
St Mark's Campanile with its pointed capA plain square shaft, an arched belfry, then a pyramid spire with a golden weather vane. Venice.
Tokyo Tower in crossed linesAn A-shaped lattice like the Eiffel Tower, and taller than it. Fill the legs with small crossed lines.
The Tower of Hercules above the coastAn ancient Roman lighthouse in A Coruña, Spain: a tall square tower on a headland over the Atlantic.
Domes and temples 12
Angkor Wat: five towers above long galleriesRaised galleries rise in steps to five towers set like the dots on a die. Siem Reap, Cambodia.
Borobudur as a stepped moundNine platforms in a stack, six square and three round, with a dome on the top. Central Java, Indonesia.
Florence Cathedral's eight-sided domeA tall ribbed dome on an octagonal base with a small lantern on top. Brunelleschi engineered it.
Hagia Sophia: a wide dome between minaretsA broad dome on a blocky base, smaller domes stepping down, and slim minarets that were added later. Istanbul.
Kinkaku-ji, the Golden Pavilion, in three storiesThree floors with wide roofs, each smaller than the one below. The top two are coated in gold leaf. Kyoto.
The Lotus Temple: 27 marble petalsA half-open lotus in three rings of nine petals. Draw the inner ring upright, the outer rings leaning out. Delhi.
Notre-Dame de Paris seen from the frontTwo square towers, a row of pointed doorways and a round rose window between. On an island in the Seine.
The Pantheon in Rome: a porch and a domeA triangle on columns in front of a round drum with a shallow dome. The dome has a round opening at its top.
The Parthenon's front row of columnsA low triangle resting on eight columns across the front. A former temple on the Acropolis of Athens.
Saint Basil's Cathedral and its onion domesTowers of different heights, each topped by an onion dome with its own pattern: nine in all. Red Square, Moscow.
The Taj Mahal: one big dome among slim minaretsA square block with a tall arched doorway, an onion dome above it and minarets around it. White marble. Agra.
The Temple of Heaven's round hallA round hall with a cone-shaped roof on a round marble base of three levels. Beijing.
Ancient monuments 12
A moai from Easter Island, head and shouldersA long face with a heavy brow, a long nose and long ears. The head is three-eighths of the whole statue.
Abu Simbel's four seated giantsA sloping rock face with one doorway in the middle and two huge seated statues on each side of it. Egypt.
The Bent Pyramid with its change of slopeSteep sides at 54 degrees that turn to 43 degrees partway up, so each edge has a bend. Dahshur, Egypt.
The Colosseum with its outer wall broken off on one sideThree stories of arches under a tall top story. Only the north side of that outer wall still stands. Rome.
Djoser's Step Pyramid as six stacked boxesSix flat boxes stacked, each smaller than the one below. It was Egypt's first pyramid.
The Great Pyramid of Giza as one triangleOne big triangle with a second face in shade. It is the biggest pyramid in Egypt.
The Great Sphinx lying in front of a pyramidA lion's body stretched out with its front paws forward, and a human head. The statue faces east.
The Great Wall of China over three hillsA wall with a notched top winding over the hills, with a square watchtower on each crest.
Machu Picchu's terraces below a peakTerraces and roofless stone walls stepping down a ridge with a peak behind. An Inca citadel in Peru.
Stonehenge: two uprights and a lintel, repeatedA trilithon is two standing stones joined by one laid across the top. Draw several in a ring. Wiltshire.
The three pyramids of Giza in a rowThree overlapping triangles for the pyramids of Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure, on a line of sand.
The Treasury at Petra, cut into a cliffA two-level front of columns and pediments, carved by hand from a sandstone cliff, not built. Jordan.
Castles and palaces 12
Bodiam Castle in the middle of its moatFour walls in a ring with a tower at each corner and at the gate, all topped by battlements. East Sussex, England.
Buckingham Palace: a long front with a balconyA wide rectangle with rows of windows, columns in the middle and the balcony at its center. London.
Castel del Monte, an eight-sided castleAn octagon of plain walls with towers on its corners, standing on a hill in Apulia, Italy.
The Château de Chambord's crowded rooflineRound corner towers under a roof like a town skyline: towers of 11 kinds and chimneys of three types.
Edinburgh Castle on Castle RockA dark crag with steep sides and a line of walls and blocky buildings along its top. Scotland.
The Forbidden City: sweeping roofs over a gatewayA high wall with gateways and, on top, a wide hall with sweeping roofs. The palace complex in Beijing.
The Hawa Mahal's honeycomb frontFive floors of small arched bays, wide at the base and narrow at the top, with 953 small windows. Jaipur.
Himeji Castle, the White HeronStacked roofs with upturned corners above a stone base, each floor smaller. Brilliant white walls. Japan.
Mont-Saint-Michel: an island topped by a spireA rocky tidal island ringed by walls and houses, with an abbey and its spire at the very top. Normandy.
The Palace of Versailles from its gardensA very long, low palace front with rows of tall windows. The Hall of Mirrors is inside. Near Paris.
The Potala Palace climbing its hillWide sloping walls and long stairways stepping up a hillside, rising 13 stories. Lhasa.
The White Tower of the Tower of LondonA big square keep with a tower at each corner, each with a small cap. By the Thames in London.
Modern shapes 12
The Atomium: spheres joined by tubesShiny spheres joined by straight steel tubes. Draw the circles first, then the tubes between. Brussels.
The Berlin TV Tower with its sphereA thin shaft, a sphere near the top and an antenna above it. It stands next to Alexanderplatz.
Burj Khalifa stepping up to a needleSlim tubes of different heights bundled around a core, ending in a spire. Its floor plan is Y-shaped. Dubai.
Canton Tower, narrow at the waistAn oval at the base and an oval at the top, joined by crossing lines that pinch in the middle. Guangzhou.
The Cathedral of Brasília's crown of columnsSixteen curved concrete columns that lean in, then flare out again at the top like a crown.
The Centre Pompidou with its insides outsideA big box whose frame, pipes and walkways are all on the outside of the building. Paris.
The Guggenheim Museum Bilbao's metal curvesCurved, overlapping shapes like a ship's hull, covered in titanium panels that catch the light. Spain.
The Guggenheim Museum in New York as a banded drumA round building wider at the top than at the bottom, in bands. Inside is a six-story spiral ramp.
Habitat 67: a hillside of stacked boxesConcrete boxes stacked and offset like building blocks: 354 identical modules. Montreal.
The Louvre Pyramid in its courtyardOne triangle crossed with diagonal lines for the glass panes, with palace wings behind. Paris.
The Montreal Biosphere, a ball of trianglesA circle filled with a net of small triangles: a geodesic dome designed by Buckminster Fuller.
The Sydney Opera House shellsA row of pointed shells leaning the same way, like sails, on a flat podium beside Sydney Harbour.
Bridges 12
The Akashi Kaikyō Bridge: two towers, one long curveA suspension bridge in Japan: two tall towers, a long cable curve slung between them and a level deck.
The Chapel Bridge in LucerneA covered wooden footbridge that crosses the Reuss on a diagonal, roofed along its whole length.
Charles Bridge lined with statuesA stone bridge of low arches over the Vltava, with statues standing on the pillars along both sides. Prague.
The Forth Bridge's great steel diamondsA cantilever railway bridge in Scotland: huge diamond-shaped frames of tubes joined by short spans.
Kintai Bridge: five wooden arches in a rowFive wooden humps in a line across the Nishiki River. Iwakuni, Japan.
The Millau Viaduct on its tall piersA cable-stayed road bridge over the Tarn valley: each mast holds a fan of cables above a very tall pier.
The Pont du Gard in three tiersThree rows of arches, one above the other, the top row the smallest. A Roman aqueduct in southern France.
The Ponte Vecchio and its row of small shopsThree low arches over the Arno with a jumble of small buildings along the top. Florence.
The Rialto Bridge rising to a peak over the Grand CanalA single stone span, highest in the middle, with a row of arches along its top. Venice.
Stari Most: one hump-backed archA single stone arch over a river with a fortified tower at each end. It crosses the Neretva in Mostar.
The Sydney Harbour Bridge as one great archA steel arch with the deck passing through it, hung from the arch on upright lines.
Tower Bridge with its roadway raisedTwo bridge towers joined by walkways at the top. The middle span lifts in two halves. London.
How this list was compiled: Original list written for Draw This Next on 2026-10-02: 72 real buildings, monuments and bridges to draw, in six kinds (towers, domes and temples, ancient monuments, castles and palaces, modern shapes, bridges), each marked easy, medium or hard. The views and the drawing hints are our own. The fact in each hint (what the building is, where it stands, a counted feature) was read on 2026-10-02 in that building's article in the English Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org; text free to reuse under CC BY-SA 4.0): Abu Simbel, Akashi Kaikyō Bridge, Al-Khazneh, Angkor Wat, Atomium, Belém Tower, Bent Pyramid, Big Ben, Bodiam Castle, Borobudur, Buckingham Palace, Burj Khalifa, CN Tower, Canton Tower, Castel del Monte, Apulia, Cathedral of Brasília, Centre Pompidou, Charles Bridge, Château de Chambord, Colosseum, Edinburgh Castle, Eiffel Tower, Fernsehturm Berlin, Florence Cathedral, Forbidden City, Forth Bridge, Giralda, Giza pyramid complex, Great Pyramid of Giza, Great Sphinx of Giza, Great Wall of China, Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, Habitat 67, Hagia Sophia, Hawa Mahal, Himeji Castle, Kapellbrücke, Kinkaku-ji, Kintai Bridge, Kuwait Towers, Leaning Tower of Pisa, Lotus Temple, Louvre Pyramid, Machu Picchu, Millau Viaduct, Moai, Mont-Saint-Michel, Montreal Biosphere, Notre-Dame de Paris, Palace of Versailles, Pantheon, Rome, Parthenon, Pont du Gard, Ponte Vecchio, Potala Palace, Pyramid of Djoser, Qutb Minar, Rialto Bridge, Saint Basil's Cathedral, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Space Needle, St Mark's Campanile, Stari Most, Stonehenge, Sydney Harbour Bridge, Sydney Opera House, Taj Mahal, Temple of Heaven, Tokyo Tower, Tower Bridge, Tower of Hercules, Tower of London. A detail not found there was left out. Landmarks only: no company headquarters, shop, theme park or stadium, and no sign or logo is described. Temples, churches and mosques are listed as architecture. Licence: own work
How it works
Seventy-two real monuments, buildings and bridges, each named, with the basic shapes to draw it from and one checked fact. The page opens on the easy ones.
Read the full guide
Easy landmarks to draw from one or two shapes
The page opens on the 36 marked Easy: a triangle, a box or an arch with one telling detail. The Eiffel Tower as a tall letter A needs two curved legs and three bars. The Pont du Gard in three tiers is three rows of arches. Choose Any level under the button for all 72.
Easy to draw pyramids
Four are among the Ancient monuments: the Great Pyramid of Giza as one triangle, the three pyramids of Giza in a row, Djoser's Step Pyramid as six stacked boxes and the Bent Pyramid with its change of slope. The Louvre Pyramid in its courtyard is a fifth, in glass.
Draw the outline as one flat shape first. Windows and columns come last.
Check the proportions against a photograph, and write the name and the city underneath.
Questions and answers
What are some easy famous buildings to draw?
Big Ben's clock tower with one round clock face, the Sydney Opera House shells and the Taj Mahal, one big dome among slim minarets, are each two or three plain shapes. Easy holds 36.
What are some easy places to draw?
Famous places with one strong outline: Edinburgh Castle on Castle Rock, Bodiam Castle in the middle of its moat, or Stonehenge. For scenery such as a lake or a coast, see the landscape list.
Which bridges are easy to draw?
Six of the 12 bridges are marked Easy. Stari Most is one hump-backed arch, Kintai Bridge is five wooden arches in a row, and the Akashi Kaikyō Bridge is two towers and one long curve.
How many pyramids are at Giza?
Three main ones: the Great Pyramid, the pyramid of Khafre and the pyramid of Menkaure. The Great Pyramid, also called the Pyramid of Khufu, is the largest of the Egyptian pyramids.