Earlier this week I was inspired to decorate a paper fan with a cherry blossom design. Since the paper was pretty thin I opted to use aqua markers. I liked how it turned out but it wasn’t quite what had in mind so I had the idea to use watercolor ground to treat the paper.

This afternoon I put a thin coat of the Daniel Smith watercolor ground in titanium white on one of the fans. I kept it pretty thin because I wanted the fan to be able to fold back up. Even with the thin coat the paper was getting quite wet and I wasn’t sure how this was going to turn out. Once it dried though, it seemed pretty sturdy while still having the flexibility to fold.

This evening, after the ground had completely dried, I made my attempt at painting a similar design to compare the two fans. I could tell the spots where the watercolor ground was pretty thin, but overall I think it worked pretty well. I didn’t use a lot of water though; I don’t think it could have handled a wet in wet technique without a few more layers of ground.

This definitely looked much closer to what I had originally envisioned for this project. I’m glad I decided to revisit this idea and look forward to experimenting on what else I can use with the watercolor ground.

Have you used watercolor ground, and if so, what surfaces have you had the most success?