Ahh, it’s already March! I have to post my latest Winter Palette before it’s irrelevant.
I’ve starred the most important colors.
Top row:
- HO Imidazolone Lemon (PY175) – I switched back to a lemon yellow because it is “cool”, but I found the yellow doesn’t really matter. Bold yellow is probably the most irrelevant color; in winter scenes I tend to use the more muted yellows. As with the Sky Palette, I include it mostly because I like how it looks in the pan, and in the pan the cool yellow looks more wintry.
- DS Pyrrol Scarlet (PR255) – It was between this and PR209 for winter sunsets, and I figured the color with a deeper body would be more useful for other wintry pops of red like winter berries and cardinals.
- ★ DS Red Rose Deep (PV19) – a nice primary-ish magenta-pink, good for mixing. This is a ‘space-saving’ alternative to having both PR209 and PR122.
- HO Phthalo Blue Yellow Shade (PB15:3) – primary cyan/blue mixer
- ★ DV Cobalt Blue (PB28) – MVP for crisp winter skies; very “cold” feeling color
- ★ SH Cobalt Turquoise (PG50) – icy cool color with texture; nice for sparkling snow and cloud mixes
- ★ DS Rich Green Gold (PY129) – muted yet glowing vegetal green-gold
Bottom row:
- WN Naples Yellow Deep (PBr24) – Initially left off, but found myself reaching for it. It’s a sunset sky specialist, but sunset skies are a thing in winter!
- ★ DS Monte Amiata Natural Sienna (PBr7) – MVP earth yellow; previous palettes have wavered between PBr24 and this, but I think they have distinct use cases
- ★ DV Terra Cotta (PR102)– brown mixer; MVP earth orange. Note for some of the paintings below I used DS Transparent Red Oxide (PR101). They’re both good!
- ★ HO Pyrrol Rubin (PR264) – luscious and hygge crimson; surprising winter MVP
- DV Thioindigo Violet (PV19, PR88) – Quin Violet equivalent, mid-chroma purple mixes, warms up blues
- ★ DS Indanthrone Blue (PB60) – MVP dark blue/shadow color
- HO Indigo (PB15, PR122, PBk6) – tbh I didn’t really use this much, I put it in because it’s a suggested color for a class I’m taking. But it’s a good winter convenience color.
Comparison to other palettes
I keep feeling like my palettes are converging and getting more and more similar! This is pretty different from my last winter palette, but it’s quite similar to my more recent sky palette.
Winter Palette 2025
Four colors are directly in common with my last winter palette: Naples Yellow Deep, Terra Cotta, Cobalt Turquoise, and Indanthrone Blue.
Sky Palette II
As I mentioned, this bears a fair amount of resemblance to my most recently assembled palette, the Sky Palette II, which I acknowledged also makes a good winter palette.
Six colors are directly in common: Naples Yellow Deep, Pyrrol Scarlet, Thioindigo Violet, Phthalo Blue GS, Cobalt Blue, Cobalt Turquoise.
Spring Palette 2025
Actually, this winter palette has a lot in common with last year’s Spring Palette, which I think means it will be a good one to carry me through late winter into spring!
Six colors are in common with last year’s Spring Palette: Imidazolone Lemon, Phthalo Blue GS, MANS, TC, Indanthrone Blue, and Rich Green Gold.
A crucial missing color is Phthalo Green YS (PG36) for those vibrant new spring buds; I’ll have to make room for it as they begin to appear.
Winter Palette 2026 in action
For dark pine greens, I’ve enjoyed the combination of Indanthrone Blue, Rich Green Gold, and Pyrrol Rubin for muting. And the same Pyrrol Rubin, plus TRO (or Terra Cotta) and MANS, can mix good dry grass and shrubs.
Indanthrone Blue is my go-to for distant landscapes and snow shadows. I’ve found the combo of Pyrrol Rubin and Cobalt Turquoise surprisingly great for clouds.
Phthalo Blue GS is useful for intensely blue winter skies; I mix it with a little of the Quin Violet to reduce the green undertone. The same mix, with more violet and some MANS for desaturation, is useful for snow shadows. RGG mixed with MANS is my main vegetation color; I dropped it directly into wet sky to push away the crown of this early spring willow. I then glazed in shadows with Terra Cotta. This scene is a tribute to my refusal to use Ultramarine Blue or Quin Gold.
This was an experiment in not using gray for a gray landscape. (I also used too much water and layers for the travel sketchbook paper, ah well.) The background sky glow is a light mix of MANS and Imidazolone Lemon, while the clouds over it use a palette gray-violet mix that includes Cobalt Blue, Indigo, MANS, and Pyrrol Rubin.
Conclusion
Something that pleases me about this winter palette is that every single color is one I truly enjoy, not one that I feel I “need to have”. Indigo comes closest to be perfunctory because I did put it on for a class, but it’s also convenient and I like the color. Quin Violet is a color I used to dislike because I expected it to be brighter, but I have come to really like its slight mutedness as a source of mysterious vibes; it’s also my favorite for turning Phthalo Blue GS into a suitable sky color that’s not too green. I think a little mutedness in the sky is good for selling it: it shouldn’t too purple.
The more I do these seasonal and revamped palettes, the more I feel I’m slowly closing on my overall preferred colors. I guess for me it’s just a slow, multi-year process of winnowing it down instead of the more sensible and cost-effective practice of building up.