Watercolor Travel Palettes and Kits

Vail, AZ 

Feb 25, 2022

I love gear!

I especially love small really clever gear.  So, it follows that I really love putting together really useful, easy-to-carry travel sketching kits.  I now have more than I could possibly ever need, but it also means that I really don't have any excuse not to sketch when I'm out and about as I can stash a sketch kit in both vehicles and every handbag and even my pockets.

First, the palettes

I prefer palettes that have full/half pans that can be replaced (as opposed to built in wells for the paint).  With replaceable pans, I can easily swap out colors to suit the situation.  I have so many small travel palettes, that I'm now trying to fit them out with a color range to fit the locations I'm sketching - for instance, the colors I'm likely to use in a Southwestern landscape is quite different than one for sketching the oceans and forests of the Pacific Northwest.

My studio palette is a massive porcelain beauty - but, of course, not at all suitable for moving around - it's heavy, breakable, and messy - no cover except tor the glass I cover it with to try to slow the paint drying out.   The porcelain is lovely to mix on, there are lots of wells for paint and two really good sized mixing areas.

Really clean at the moment!

I have a couple of mid-sized folding palettes that I use primarily (now, they used to be my primary palettes) for workshops where I know I'll be using a lot of paint but not moving around too much.  

They work pretty well - but even the one with the sealing lid does leak.  They have the advantage of being easier to carry around, lots of wells (but not replaceable pans), and they are inexpensive, easy available and lightweight.

Folded, these are about 5"x11"

These next ones are really the most useful for urban sketching and travel sketching.

My absolute favorite is the Winsor and Newton Travel Watercolor Kit.  I've had mine for almost 40 years.  It is sold with either Professional W&N watercolor half-pans or W&N Cottman (student grade) paints.  Generally, I don't like pre-loaded palettes - the colors they choose to include invariably include several that I don't use (for instance, I never use black watercolor, and, if I'm going to need white paint - a gouache white performs much better than a watercolor white).  Unfortunately, this W&N kit only comes with paint - I'd advise getting the Cottman set and just replacing the student grade pans with your own choices.  I wish they sold it empty!

By adding a couple of half pans, you can fit in an extra 2 colors, bringing your total to 14!  Part of the cover pops off to provide a water container, and there is a small plastic bottle to carry water incorporated into the kit.  They also provide a truly useless teeny, tiny itsy bitsy brush.  The mixing areas are a bit fragile feeling - but, in 40 years, I haven't had mine break.  The plastic hinge on the middle tray of paint pans did break - but it doesn't really make a difference.

I've stored a color swatch ID of the paints underneath the water container.

Really, just the cutest thing!! approx 2.5"x1.5"x5"

My next favorite is this Honbay metal palette. These are made by a number of companies and are relatively inexpensive.  You can also buy empty half=pans on Amazon quite cheaply (I got like 50 for about $10).  I'd really love it if it had 3 mixing areas - but, at the time I was looking, the one with 3 mixing areas was like triple the price.

With a little creativity, you can mix and match full pans and half-pans - this is a huge advantage as I think everyone has 2 or 3 go-to colors that will get used up quickly - so it's really nice to have a few full pans in your kit.  I wedged 15 half-pans and 3 full-pans into this kit.

Here's another W&N field kit - I'm not sure it's being made anymore, but they have similar models filled with the cottman paints for around $20.  The tiny brush is useless, the clip-on water container is a joke, but it does have a pull out mixing tray on the bottom which really increases the already generous number of mixing wells.  Also, the thumb-hole is actually functional, unlike most of the rings that all the other travel palettes have (I find that the rings are very awkward to use!)

In terms of cuteness, the Micro Portable Painter is in a dead heat with my old W&N kit - except that it's MUCH tinier  - squeeeee!  SO CUTE.  Yet, so functional - 6 half-pans, 4 little mixing areas and a generous water cup.  It comes with a felt carrying bag - :) otherwise, you might just misplace it.

Folded up, this is approx 2.25"x2.5"x1" - truly pocket-sized!

Then we have the homemade DIY options!!

There a million DIY'ers out there with very creative ways to fill an old Altoid tin with watercolors.  Basically, you need to stabilize your half-pans in the tin somehow - I use that blue tac stuff to stick them in place, but you can also use double sticky sided foam tape, or flexible sheets of magnetic tape (I've up-cycled old magnetized business cards that appliance companies hope you will stick on your fridge for future reference).

Here are 2 that I've constructed.  They do rust out eventually, but they're easily replaced.  Or, take a look on Etsy - there are some DIY'ers that have spent a lot more effort and time to make some really nice versions!

I've used a water bottle cap for a small water cup, and sacrificed some space to hold a folding brush.

I've glued a color swatch on top Identifying the colors in the box.

 

In this one, I used a tiny Altoids tin.  It still fits 4 colors and I can put it into in my pen bag for quick every day sketching.  The pen bag has a couple of water brushes that I use instead of carrying water.  It still fits 5 half-pans!  

I carry this palette with a very strong magnet on the bottom.  By placing the magnet under a couple of sheets of my sketchbook, the tin will stick to the page - making it very convenient to used while sketching on location in a sketchbook!!

Even almost upside down, the magnet holds this little palette tight!!

The rest of the kit!!

All of the small palettes fit into sandwich sized zip-lock bags.  I add paper towel, a travel brush or two, and a small cosmetic spray bottle (to activate the watercolors) to complete the watercolor kit.  A small pencil bag with pens and pencils and my sketchbook complete my basic travel sketch kit.  I usually stick these supplies into a shoulder bag or a day pack with the usual water bottle, hat, sunscreen etc. that one would normally carry on any day trip.  If I'm really ambitious, I might take a very light folding stool.