How to Blend Colors Beautifully with Watercolor Lettering

Blending Watercolors

Watching two watercolors bleed into each other is perhaps one of the most satisfying things to watch. It is relaxing to behold and leaves a simply stunning effect when dry. It’s no wonder that watercolors are a popular option for hand lettering, but it can be a bit tough to figure out how to blend multiple colors in one watercolor lettering piece. Finally, I’ve gotten around to making a video showing how to make it happen. And guess what? It’s way easier than you’d think!

Materials for Watercolor Lettering

Canson XL 140lb paper

Pentel Aquash Water Brush Pens

Dr. Ph. Martin’s Hydrus Watercolors

Loew Cornell Palette

Spray Bottle

Rag or Paper Towel

Show and Tell

This is one of those things that is a million times easier to show through video instead of pictures. For one, watercolors dry fast, so stopping to take pictures is just not possible. And two, watching watercolors blend in video is the BEST. So enjoy this quick tutorial to see how it’s done!

The Trick Behind a Clean Blend

Basically, it all comes down to two things: moving fast and using a clean brush.

When you’re trying to get the colors to bleed into each other, you have to be certain that your watercolor lettering stays wet. If it dries, then no blending for you. Of course, if that happens, you can still salvage the blend by going over the dried letter again with the same color, but that’s quite the hassle. So do it right by moving fast and keeping those letters damp!

Even though you’re moving fast, you need to keep an eye on the colors on your brush. If you forget to clean off your brush in between colors, you could end up with a muddy mix of colors. That means that if you’re trying to blend yellow and blue from letter to letter, you’ll quickly be working entirely in green. But if you clean off your brush every time you pick up a new color, you’ll have yellow and blue showing their distinctive hues.

Struggling with Brush Lettering?

If you want to try this technique but you are still stuck on the basics of brush lettering, then I have just the resource to help you out. My course Brush Lettering 101 is designed just for people like you! I created this course to help total beginners get past those first frustrating steps and onto the fun part of lettering. It’s perfect if you have never touched a brush pen or you have tried lettering to no avail. In Brush Lettering 101, you will learn all the fundamentals so you can get beyond the beginner level. Then this watercolor blending technique will be a piece of cake!

Practice Makes Progress

Once you get the hang of it, you won’t ever want to stop. It is so easy to create stunning pieces of watercolor lettering when you use lots of gorgeous, bold colors together. Just remember to keep practicing and playing with your materials. Watercolor is unpredictable, which can be frustrating, but that’s what makes the final result so fun! So stick with it, keep messing around, and you’ll get this technique down in no time flat.

Explore More Art Tutorials

If you enjoyed this colorful watercolor technique, then you’d definitely love my course Watercolor Lettering: Learn How to Blend Colors and Letter Boldly With Watercolors on Foxsy!

Watercolor Lettering is a fantastic class that walks you through every step of creating gorgeous lettering projects with confidence. You’ll learn everything: my favorite supplies, how to control color intensity, how to blend colors like a pro, and more. Then, to top it off, you’ll get to practice your new skills with three work-along projects that you’ll want to hang in your house.

And with a Foxsy membership, you also gain access to the growing creative course library! Foxsy is packed with art classes to help you grow your watercolor, lettering, drawing, and creative journaling skills — and more classes are added every month.

Take the next step on your creative journey and get your Foxsy membership today!