In this watercolor painting tutorial, you’ll learn how to paint loose Primrose flowers. The loose painting style will help you drop into a creative flow so you can enjoy a calm and relaxing painting session. 

Today, we’ll be painting delicate pink primroses, but they come in a few different varieties. You can find them in shades of pink, yellow, white, and even purple! I share this so you know that you can always take the fundamental techniques you learn in these tutorials and mix it up to create your own unique compositions and color varieties.

Now get cozy, grab your favorite watercolor supplies, and let’s dive in!

Supplies

Here are some suggestions for what to use for this tutorial. If you already have supplies readily available feel free to use them so you can get to painting!

• Pencil 

• Eraser

• Palette

• Clean Water

• Paper Towels

• Watercolor Paper

• Watercolor Paintbrush

• Watercolor Paint 

I have linked my favorite supplies above. These are affiliate links which means if you purchase anything linked in this post, I will make a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you!

Drawing Primroses in Perspective

Let’s start by going over a quick drawing tutorial so you can understand how to paint the primroses from different perspectives. This will add some extra interest to your composition rather than having them all facing directly forward. 

If you’d like to skip ahead to the painting portion click here!

The primrose typically has four petals, which are shaped like a cup or bowl. To draw it straight on, start with a circle with rays that crisscross to help you space out the petals accurately. These rays will serve as guidelines to help you place the petals.

You should be drawing with a pencil, so you can erase the guidelines. I’m drawing with a Sharpie so that you can see it on camera.

Next, draw your petals around each ray. Now, you have the basic shape of a primrose! 

Once you are comfortable with drawing a primrose from this perspective, try drawing it from the side. 

 Start with an oval at the top and a dot for the center (pictured in red below). Then, draw a half circle to connect the oval and the dot. This will create the outline of the flower.

Next, draw a ray through the center to help you visualize the petal placement from this angle. 

From there, use the ray as a guideline and draw the closest petal to you. The top of the petal should hit right at the top of the bowl shape.

Next, fill in the remaining three petals to line up with the first. The bottoms of the side petals will create the bowl shape of the flower. Once you are done with the petals, you can erase the guidelines for a more finished look. 

It can be helpful to practice drawing primroses from different angles so you will have a more visually interesting composition for your painting. 

Painting Primroses in a Loose Watercolor Style

Let’s start by taking a look at a reference image of primroses so you have an idea of what you’ll be painting

Since the primrose is a dainty flower, start by adding water to your paper before adding any pigment. This will allow the colors to blend gently, and it will give the flower a more natural feel.

Loosely draw the shape of the primrose petals with water.

Then, add a little pink pigment to your brush and start to drop it into the petals. From here, the water will do all of the work as it allows the pigment to soften and blend with the wet-into-wet technique. You can use just one pink paint for this whole project - remember, adding more water to your paints will dilute them and give you a lighter pink. 

As you continue to paint, drop in darker hues for variation and keep the strokes light and loose.

Continue the process of loosely painting the primrose shapes from different perspectives. As you paint, it will start to look like a cluster of fluffy floral blobs. If you want to watch my painting process, check out this section of the video tutorial.

Quick Note: These delicate flowers may not look great during the beginning stages. They tend to start out looking really blobby and shapeless. But trust the process! We’ll continue to paint in layers, and you will see these beauties come to life!

Next, drop some yellow into the center of the flowers while they’re still wet. No worries if the paint runs a little bit here – we’re aiming for a looser style of painting after all! Plus the colors mix so nicely when they blend on the paper!

Stems and Leaves

Now it’s time to add some foliage! Grab some green and start filling in your composition with leaves. I love to mix my own greens since I think it gives my paintings a lot more depth and interest. 

But sometimes when I’m working quickly, I start with a pre-made green on my palette and make it more interesting by incorporating other colors. For these primrose leaves, I added Payne’s gray to Hooker’s Green to create a darker more muted green.

The leaves themselves have pokey edges and usually have a good bit of color variety. So grab a filbert paint brush, choose a few different greens, and see what variations you can create! 

Wet on Dry Technique

The wet on dry method is where you apply wet paint onto an already dried layer. Doing this allows for more control and precision in your details. 

Once your first layer of leaves has dried, add darker greens to the leaves and stems. These darker details trick the eye into seeing shadows and highlights even in a loose style like this — pretty cool, right? It’s starting to come together!

Painting the Petal Details

Now, we’re going to add some detail to the petals to take them from blob to beautiful! Grab a small round brush for this section. Then, start to define the petals by adding details with a darker pink like Quinacridone Rose. I’m outlining the edge of the petals so they’re more clearly defined, and adding thin veins to bring some elements of realism to this loose painting.

If you’d like, you can also create subtle shading by glazing your petals. All you have to do is add a little pink paint to your brush and paint in the areas where you’d like to add shadow.

As you can see, patience is key! The flowers that started out as blobs became stunning primroses after adding in multiple layers and details! 

I’d love to see your beautiful primroses! Join me in my Free Watercolor Facebook Group and share your work with a wonderful community of watercolor artists. 

Happy painting,

Alex