Cheap paper first, and why 140lb matters
Supplies are settled, so this lesson focuses on paper alone — the place most beginners quietly sabotage themselves before they ever pick up a brush.
Start with the core fact: paper is not paper. Printer paper, sketchbook paper, that pad of "art paper" that's really just slightly nicer printer paper — none of it holds water the way watercolor paper does. Watercolor is, at its core, a water problem. You're moving wet pigment across a surface and asking that surface to cooperate, and most surfaces won't.
I learned this the hard way. My very first wash ever, I used regular printer paper because I didn't know any better and didn't want to drive back out for real paper. I laid down water and color and watched the whole sheet warp into a potato-chip shape, corners curling like it was trying to get away from the paint. I taped the next sheet down on all four edges, proud of myself for solving it. It still buckled — just less dramatically. At some point I stopped fighting it and decided buckled paper was going to be part of my personality. It still kind of is.
What 140lb actually means
Watercolor paper is labeled by weight in pounds. That number tells you how thick and heavy the sheet is, which tells you how much water it can take before it gives up and warps or pills apart under your brush. The three you'll see:
- 90lb — thin. Fine for very dry, light sketching, but it warps fast. Not what we're using here.
- 140lb — the standard workhorse weight, thick enough to handle a real wash without turning into a taco. This is what I want you buying.
- 300lb — thick like cardstock, barely warps at all, and costs a lot more per sheet.
For this class, and honestly for the next year or two of your painting life, 140lb is the number to look for. Don't overthink it beyond that.
The opinion to plant now: buy cheap 140lb
Buy the cheap 140lb paper, not the fancy stuff. The fancy cotton paper looks nicer, sits nicer, and feels nicer under your hand — and it is expensive. Here's what expensive does to a beginner: you get it home, sit down to paint, and some part of your brain says "this cost real money, don't mess it up," so you tighten up. You paint scared. You second-guess every brushstroke because you don't want to waste a four-dollar sheet.
Ruin the cheap stuff instead. Buy the student-grade 140lb pad — basically wood pulp instead of cotton rag — and go through it fast. Learn what too much water looks like. Learn what a blown-out wash looks like. Learn what happens when you load your brush too heavy and drag it across the page (bless, we've all done it). None of that matters on a two-dollar sheet; it matters a lot on a twenty-dollar one, and that fear is exactly what keeps beginners from loosening up. You will get more out of ruining ten cheap sheets than being precious with two good ones. I promise.
Practical steps for this week
- Buy a pad, not loose sheets. Cheaper per page and easier to store.
- Look for "140lb" or "300gsm" on the label — those are the same weight, just different unit systems, so don't panic if the number looks different.
- Student grade is fine. Look for words like "student" or "practice" on the packaging. Skip anything that says "artist grade" or "100% cotton" for now — save that money.
- Tape it down if you want, especially for a big wash. I use painter's tape on all four edges. It still might buckle a little. That's not a failure, that's just paper being paper.
- Cut or tear it small if the pad is big. A quarter sheet is plenty for practicing a wash. No reason to commit a full sheet to a technique you're just testing.
One note on the dry air here: a wash on cheap paper in American Fork sets up fast, faster than most online tutorials expect, because most of them were filmed somewhere humid. That's actually a good reason to practice on cheap paper specifically — you'll blow through sheets while you get a feel for how quick things dry at our elevation, and it costs you almost nothing.
Before next time
Grab a pad of cheap 140lb paper if you don't already have one, and don't feel bad if you use up half of it just messing around before class. That's the whole point of it existing.