Iris buds in watercolour can be relatively fast, easy and fun! This sample took just a couple minutes or so using my watercolours. It can get a bit addictive and you keep doing more!
I used my Rekab 320s #2 with Arches 100% cotton paper and the colours used were Winsor Lemon, Cobalt blue, Permanent Rose and dash of Ultramarine.
See my post on Watercolour Basic Materials for more info on beginner’s supplies.
First step was to load brush with mixed purple and lay gently onto paper tip up.
Following this, applied light wash of dilute yellow under, not touching – the bud. Then mixing green let the brush glide right down the stem.
Cleaned the brush, dried it off a bit, and ‘kissed’ the tip where the yellow was meant to meet the bud. Carefully, as I wanted control.
If you do a big iris petal, I suggest you do the purple petal first. Making sure it is lighter on top and slightly darker on bottom.
Let it dry. Then you can wash in the dilute yellow bit. Painting the yellow in when the purple is damp/wet = mud! or grey or brown. It pollutes the yellow, which generally speaking I do not want to do.
debi riley 
lovely
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