My urban sketching watercolor palette has gradually gotten smaller. I used to carry far more colors because I thought having more choices would make me better prepared. In practice, I spent more time deciding what to use and carried paint I rarely touched.
I eventually settled on a compact 12-pan setup. That’s enough room for warm and cool primaries, several useful earth colors and neutrals, plus one or two colors I can change depending on where I’m sketching.
The goal isn’t to create the one perfect watercolor palette. It’s to carry enough range that I can mix what I need without turning a day of sketching into a paint-management exercise.
How I Build a 12-Color Urban Sketching Palette
I think of the twelve spaces in three groups:
| Palette section | Number of pans | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Warm and cool primaries | 6 | Give me a broad mixing range |
| Earth colors and neutrals | 4 | Buildings, shadows, muted color and natural subjects |
| Flexible colors | 2 | Colors I enjoy or want for a particular location |
I don’t think every sketcher needs these exact proportions, but the framework keeps me from filling an entire travel palette with attractive colors that all perform nearly the same job.
Start With Warm and Cool Primary Colors
The backbone of my palette is a warm and cool version of yellow, red and blue.
That gives me six colors with enough variation to mix a surprisingly wide range of secondary colors, neutrals and muted mixtures.
| Color role | Examples I consider |
|---|---|
| Warm yellow | New Gamboge or Benzimidazolone Yellow Deep |
| Cool yellow | Lemon Yellow or Hansa Yellow Light |
| Warm red | Pyrrol Scarlet or Cadmium Red Light |
| Cool red | Quinacridone Rose or Permanent Alizarin Crimson |
| Warm blue | Ultramarine Blue |
| Cool blue | Phthalo Blue GS or Cobalt Blue |
I don’t need every possible primary pigment. I want six colors I understand well enough that I can predict what will happen when I mix them.
Why I Carry Both Warm and Cool Primaries
The advantage isn’t simply having more versions of red, yellow and blue.
Different combinations let me push a mixture toward something brighter, warmer, cooler or more muted without reaching immediately for another premixed color.
That matters on location because a relatively small palette still needs to handle a wide range of subjects:
- Warm building facades
- Cool shadows
- Blue or gray skies
- Green trees and plants
- Brick and stone
- People and clothing
- Water and reflections
The more familiar I become with those pigments, the less I have to think about them while I’m actually sketching.
Add Earth Colors and Useful Neutrals
After the primaries, I want several colors that save time when I’m painting subjects I see constantly.
The colors I consider particularly useful include:
- Burnt Sienna: useful for brick, warm architecture, skin and neutral mixtures
- Yellow Ochre or Raw Sienna: useful for muted warm surfaces, stone and natural subjects
- Payne’s Gray or Neutral Tint: useful when I need to establish a dark quickly
- Raw Umber: useful for muted browns, trees, wood and earth
I can mix many of these kinds of colors from primaries, but having several ready-made earth colors is convenient when I’m working quickly.
Leave One or Two Spaces Flexible
I like leaving one or two pans available for colors that aren’t strictly necessary.
Sometimes they’re colors I simply enjoy using. Other times I’ll change them depending on the location, season or subjects I expect to sketch.
Cobalt Teal is one example I like around coastal or waterfront subjects. A darker green or muted violet might make more sense somewhere else.
Those flexible spaces keep the palette personal without allowing it to expand back into the oversized setup I was trying to escape.
A Simple 12-Pan Palette Framework
If I were building a compact palette from scratch, this is the structure I’d use:
- Warm yellow
- Cool yellow
- Warm red
- Cool red
- Warm blue
- Cool blue
- Burnt Sienna
- Yellow Ochre or Raw Sienna
- Payne’s Gray or Neutral Tint
- Raw Umber or another useful earth color
- Personal or location-specific color
- Second flexible color
This isn’t meant as a required shopping list. It’s a way to decide what job each pan should perform before filling it.
Three Watercolor Mixes I Use Often
A smaller palette becomes more useful when I know how the colors interact.
Several combinations I come back to are:
- Burnt Sienna + Ultramarine: a useful neutral gray mixture
- Lemon Yellow + Phthalo Blue: a bright green starting point
- Quinacridone Rose + Cobalt Blue: a violet mixture
I would rather know a handful of pigments extremely well than carry twice as many colors and constantly guess how they’ll behave together.
Make a Mixing Chart Before Taking the Palette Outside
One of the easiest ways to learn a new palette is to mix the colors before relying on them in a location sketch.
I can take two colors at a time and make small mixtures that move from mostly one pigment to mostly the other.
That quickly shows me:
- Which combinations create bright secondaries
- Which combinations neutralize each other
- How dark a mixture can become
- Which pigments overpower others
- Which mixtures I actually like enough to use again
I can also practice from my urban sketching reference photos before taking a new palette outside.
How I Arrange the Colors in the Palette
I like a layout that I can understand without stopping to search for a particular pan.
One simple approach is keeping warmer colors toward one side and cooler colors toward the other, with earth colors and neutrals grouped where they make sense to me.
The specific order isn’t as important as consistency.
Once I’ve used the same layout repeatedly, I start reaching for colors automatically. That’s particularly useful when I’m trying to paint quickly before a person moves or the light changes.
Why I Prefer a Small Travel Palette
I used to carry as many as 24 colors because I thought more paint meant more flexibility.
For me, the opposite happened.
The larger palette meant:
- More weight
- More decisions
- More colors I rarely used
- Less familiarity with each pigment
Reducing the palette forced me to mix more often, but it also made the mixtures across a sketch feel more related because the same colors kept reappearing.
The 12-pan tin also fits easily into my urban sketching kit without turning watercolor into the largest part of the setup.
Do You Need 12 Colors?
No. Twelve is simply the size that currently gives me a useful balance between variety and portability.
A six-color palette built around warm and cool primaries can already mix a large range of colors.
If I’m carrying fewer colors, I just need to be more comfortable mixing them.
Someone else may prefer eight colors, ten colors, or more than twelve. I care less about the number than whether every pan earns its place.
Choosing a Watercolor Palette for Beginners
If you’re new to watercolor, I wouldn’t start by buying every pigment that looks useful.
I would begin with a small group of versatile colors and learn what they’re missing through actual painting.
That way, additional colors solve real problems rather than imaginary ones.
For urban sketching in particular, I would prioritize a palette that is:
- Small enough to carry comfortably
- Easy to open and hold on location
- Large enough to mix several washes
- Filled with colors you actually understand
For the rest of the beginner setup, see my urban sketching supplies guide.
How I Keep the Palette From Becoming a Mess
I try to keep maintenance simple.
- I don’t overfill the pans.
- I let wet paint and mixing areas dry before packing everything away when possible.
- I wipe out contaminated mixtures when they start affecting the next color.
- I refill colors when they’re getting too low to load the brush comfortably.
I carry the palette so I can get to it without unpacking the rest of my gear. My urban sketching bag page explains how I organize the full carrying system.
The Palette Is Only Part of Watercolor Urban Sketching
Choosing colors solves only one part of the problem.
Once I’m actually drawing, I’m thinking much more about how much water I’m using, the size of the wash, light and dark relationships, edges, and which parts of the scene don’t need paint at all.
That’s why I keep this page focused on the palette itself. For the painting process, including how I combine watercolor with urban drawing, continue with my urban watercolor sketching guide.
A Smaller Palette Made Me Use Color More Intentionally
The biggest benefit of reducing my palette wasn’t saving a few ounces in my bag.
It was familiarity.
When I repeatedly use the same colors, I learn what they’ll do before the brush touches the page. Mixing becomes quicker, I hesitate less, and the colors across different parts of the sketch naturally relate to one another.
That’s what I want from an urban sketching watercolor palette: not every color I might possibly need, but a small set I know well enough to stop thinking about the palette and start paying attention to the place I’m drawing.