Abstract: The present invention relates to an image retrieval system using sketches. The system comprises: a device connected to a communication network having an application that allows the user to draw a query result and display images as a result, a processing unit comprising at least one search engine, a component for processing images of a collection, and a storage medium for storing images of the collection along with the feature vectors thereof. The search engine includes: a features extraction component for sketches; a component for performing similarity searches; the image processing component comprises: a component for converting an image to a sketch form and a feature extraction component for sketches. The invention also relates to the associated method.