My grandmother gave me several of her old books on art techniques, which is where I got started with painting watercolours. It was something of a revelation when I discovered that some of the fundamental techniques had changed in recent years! One thing in particular that has changed is how people paint the flat wash – a large, even, area of a single colour.

The ‘modern’ approach involves wetting the paper before you put any paint on it. If you’re interested I go into more depth on this in my class on the flat wash, and I’m sure a quick google will point you to heaps of other instruction online about this. The vintage approach to creating a flat wash works with dry paper – check it out:

Materials:

• A large brush (relative to your paper)
• Watercolour paint
• A palette well
• Paper suitable for watercolour
• Something to prop your painting surface up with (I use a roll of masking tape)
• A container of water

Method

Step 1: Prepare your supplies

Stopping to mix up more paint can mean you end up with drying lines, so before you put brush to page make sure you have enough paint ready to cover your page.

You’ll want a fairly watery mix for this technique to work well. I find that one of the little palette wells in the Windsor & Newton starter palettes holds more than enough paint to cover an entire A5 / half letter sized page.

It’s also useful if your brush is already wet, so swoosh your brush around in the water then set it to the side.

If you’re using loose paper, tape it to a firm surface with masking tape, painters’ tape, or washi tape.

Last thing to do is prop up your painting surface. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy – I use the masking tape I just used to tape my paper down. Just pop it under the board near the top and you’re good.

Step 2: Paint a Flat Wash

The key to this type of flat wash is keeping a wet edge. You’re going to paint horizontal bands of colour starting from the top and working your way down. Whichever line you’ve just painted is your “working edge” and it’s important to keep a puddle of paint wet on that edge. This prevents the dreaded drying lines.

The bigger the brush you use, the easier it is to avoid drying lines as you can cover the area much faster. But if you work quickly you can still achieve the same effect with a smaller brush. That’s why preparation is key.

Step 3: Review your flat wash

The flat wash you end up with from this approach is different from the one you get with the modern approach. For me I found that the vintage approach:

• dried much faster
• produced a more homogenous layer of colour with less texture
• buckled/warped the paper much less

Overall I can’t say that I prefer one approach over the other. Instead I find it useful to know the differences so I can pick the relevant technique to achieve the desired look for my painting.

Let me know if you’ve tried these ways of creating a flat wash. And if you’ve got any tips, preferences, or observations I’d love to hear them.

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I cover all of this, and more, in my short (23 min) Skillshare class: Bitesize Watercolour: Master Painting the Flat Wash

Not got the time to try this right now? Pin it for later: