Hot Tip: How to Flatten a Watercolor Painting
Uh oh.
Picture this: you’ve finished a watercolor painting and it’s finally dry. You untape it from your painting surface and notice immediately that it’s warped. You think: “If I just put this in a frame, it’ll smoosh up against the glass and be fine. No one will notice.” But nope! It’s still warped, even in the frame.
Of course, you could’ve stretched the watercolor paper in advance, but ya didn’t (don’t worry, I never do either). But it’s all good! I’ve got a trick that works wonders and you probably already have most of these tools at home. No iron or specialty tape required!
How I Flatten a Warped Watercolor:
Lightly spritz the back of the watercolor painting with water. Be careful not to wet the front! The back should be damp to the touch, lightly shiny, and not dripping.
Sandwich the painting between two large pieces of plain newsprint.
Place your paper/painting sandwich onto a smooth, untextured surface. (You don’t want to press a woodgrain texture into your painting!)
And weigh it down with something heavy. For large paintings, I put a down a drawing board with heavy books on top. That way, the weight is distributed more evenly.
Switch out the damp newsprint sheets with clean, dry ones every few hours. It’s okay to leave it overnight too, just make sure to switch out the newsprint before bed.
Keep repeating step #5 until it’s flat and dry! If you find there’s still a little bit of warp in it, you can repeat the entire process again.
Extra Tips:
I recommend trimming your painting after it’s flattened. It’s much easier to get straight edges and 90° corners that way!
Only ever use water in your mister! Any residual chemicals can mess with your art.
Keep the water fresh by switching it out frequently and letting the bottle dry out occasionally. Last thing you want is to use musty/stinky water on your painting.
A Quick Shopping List:
In case you don’t have any of the above materials, here’s what I use. Click on any of the images below to purchase. These are affiliate links, so you’ll also be helping to support me! Win-win!
How to choose? The Stippled Misting bottle is only $3 and does a good job but, for $5 more, the Fine Misting Bottle will give you a really even spray with little to no leakage. The fine misters are my fave! I also use them for my spray fixative as well.
Hope this was helpful!
I’d love to hear how this worked out for you! If you have any other watercolor questions that I can cover in future reels / blog posts, please don’t hesitate to shout them out in the comments below!
Happy painting and talk to you soon,
