Watercolour Wednesday – How to Paint a Quote With a Free Template

A lettering artist I admire and follow on Instagram shared a beautiful quote about nature written with brush pens. She has just moved to Germany with her family from Florida and is loving the experience of a new landscape, enjoying the flowers and foliage there. Her name is Amanda Kammarada and I love her calligraphy style.

Today was a long weekend Monday holiday, and I went to the famous Butchart Gardens here on Vancouver Island. This time of year the flowers are absolutely incredible! I have an annual pass and visit there all the seasons. The dahlias were spectacular!

This is my take on lettering Amanda’s quote (by William Wordsworth) using my Kelly Creates Watercolor Inks. I decided on an earthy colour palette of green and brown.

I mixed this ‘sap’ green by combining Emerald and Deep Yellow Watercolor Inks. And I created a brown ink by mixing orange and blue inks. 

I’m so pleased with how they blend together! The trick is to use a lot of ink on your brush and to paint only one letter at a time with the green. While the letter is still wet, clean your brush and drop in some brown. I added the brown to the bottom of each letter/stroke. Clean and dry your brush again and gently move or blend the areas where the green and brown meet. You will have to work fairly quickly so that your paint doesn’t dry while you’re blending,

This method of blending the different watercolour inks together is time consuming, but you don’t risk contaminating your palette and colours by cleaning your brush. The key is to add the second ink while the first one is still wet on the paper. It’s always helpful to practice lots on scrap watercolor paper before you commit to a final project.

Click HERE to download and print the free hand lettering quote or click the image below.

You can print this out on regular copy paper and paint directly on it or paint on a piece of tracing paper on top.

Can’t find my brand of watercolour inks? You can also use this Ecoline set too!

Another option for liquid watercolor inks is the Dr. Ph Martins ‘Hydrus’ Set 1 (there are 3 sets of different colours). And remember you need a palette with wells to use these liquid watercolours.

To practice painting letters freehand, use the heavyweight smooth Kelly Creates Grid Paper pad. (Never practice on blank paper).

To learn more about watercolor lettering, read my book The Art of Watercolor Lettering and use my workbooks, inks and supplies from the Kelly Creates AMAZON Storefront or from KellyCreatesStore.com.