Da Vinci Palettes
Da Vinci watercolors are crafted using the finest quality natural gum arabic and the highest concentration of finely-milled pigments. Carefully crafted in small batches in the United States, Da Vinci watercolors can be used straight from the tube or dried in pans to experience beautiful vibrancy, excellent dispersion, and remarkable rewetting properties.
Custom Colors by Denise
Denise's New Green
Denise’s New Green is a desaturated, earthy green with warm undertones. Tinted out, it reflects a soft sage green rather than a bright mossy green.
It can be used on its own as a convenience green or used in mixes to create a variety of greens and olives. It also makes lovely blacks when mixed with Magenta Rose or Da Vinci Violet. It is lightfast, semi-transparent, and staining.
Denise's New Green is available in Denise's Earth Friendly &
Wildlife Palettes.
Denise's Turquoise
Cerulean blue hues can be found in nearly every line of watercolors, but cobalt turquoise hues are few and far between. I worked with Da Vinci to create a non-cobalt hue of their Cobalt Turquoise Deep.
Denise’s Turquoise can mix both bright and muted greens, soft violets, warm blues, and earthy neutrals. Denise’s Turquoise is lightfast, opaque, and somewhat staining due to its PG7. It also subtly granulates due to the PB29.
Denise's Turquoise is available in Denise's Earth Friendly Palette.
Stormy Blue
Denise and Da Vinci created Stormy Blue for her Embrace Opacity palette.
Akin to a more opaque version of Payne's Gray, Stormy Blue is blue-black in masstone and softens to midnight blue in washes. It can easily be used on its own as the dark neutral on you palette and is also very helpful at darkening other colors without loosing vibrancy.
Stormy Blue is available in Denise's Embrace Opacity Palette & will be available soon in the updated Wildlife Palettes.
Denise's Green
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Denise and Da Vinci created Denise's Green for her Earth Friendly Palette as a sap green that didn't contain Nickel Azo Yellow, yet still depicted a warm, earthy glow.
This natural sap green can be used straight from the tube or as a mixing color on your palette to create a rich browns, moody teals, and beautiful turquoises.
This color was discontinued
due to a supply issue. You can mix this color using PY129 and PB60.
Denise's Gray
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Denise's Gray is a soft, granulating gray that she has been using in her home studio for years.
In concentrated washes, it appears as a neutral gray. However, in wet washes, it separates dramatically into its base colors, appearing as a cool blue-gray with rich earth red undertones. It is fantastic in mixes for creating atmospheric colors.
This color is being discontinued
due to a formula issue. You can mix this color using Cerulean Blue and a smooth Indian Red.
Earth Friendly Palette
Updated 2025
Denise’s Earth Friendly Da Vinci Watercolor Palette is a carefully curated non-toxic, vegan watercolor palette containing 24 hand-poured half pans. While watercolors tend to produce less waste than other paint mediums in general, this palette allows artists to further reduce their impact on the environment by intentionally avoiding the use of cadmiums, cobalts, manganese, and nickel pigments.
I have carefully researched each pigment included this set, focusing on their environmental impact while simultaneously striving to create a balanced mixing palette. The set includes some of my favorite primary colors, but is also joined by some eco-friendly signature colors, including a non-cobalt turquoise deep hue and an earthy sap green. The color selection is rounded off with a wide selection of earth tones that I am well known for using in my animal portraits.
I have created a mixing chart of the 24 colors in this palette to help demonstrate the range of colors that can be achieved through this versatile palette.
Each pair intersects at two points on the chart. One of the squares is painted in masstone while the other is the same mixture diluted. You can create more combinations using different ratios paint and by mixing more than two colors.
Click the image to the left to view an enlarged version of the chart.
This link is an affiliate link in which Denise earns a commission of sales to help support her and her business.
Wildlife Palette
Update Coming Soon!
Denise’s Wildlife Da Vinci Watercolor Palette is a curated watercolor palette containing 12 hand-poured half pans. This set contains a warm primary trio followed by nine earthier colors that can be mixed or used straight from the pans.
This set overlaps with my larger Earth Friendly Palette, but is a more affordable and compact travel option. It contains my most used palette staples as well as some additional colors that are ideal for painting natural subjects.
I have created a mixing chart of the 12 colors in this palette to help demonstrate the range of colors that can be achieved through this compact travel palette.
Each color pairing intersects at two points on the chart. One of the mixtures is in masstone while the other is the same mixture diluted. You can create even more combinations with different ratios paint and by mixing more than two colors at once.
Click the image above to view an enlarged version of the chart.
This link is an affiliate link in which Denise earns a commission of sales to help support her and her business.
Embrace Opacity Palette
Update Coming Soon!
Many new artists are encouraged to avoid opaque watercolors because they are said to cause muddy mixes. For this reason, it can take years for artists to discover the beauty in these often overlooked pigments.
While some craft-grade watercolors can be opaque due to chalky, low-quality fillers, the high-quality professional watercolors in this set contain naturally opaque pigments (with larger and denser particles) than those found in naturally transparent pigments.
These colors useful for creating soft, velvety textures and results in a unique painting experience that one can’t find in transparent watercolors or gouache alone.
Denise’s Embrace Opacity Da Vinci Palette is a carefully curated collection of earth yellows, oranges, and reds along with complementary shades of blue, teal, and green. Titan Buff adds a beautiful range of pastels while Lilac adds a surprising level of versatility.
My new custom colors - Denise’s Gray and Stormy Blue - can stand on their own or be used with any other color in the palette to create moody, atmospheric mixtures.
I have created a mixing chart of the 12 colors in this palette to help demonstrate the range of colors that can be achieved through this unique, atmospheric palette.
Each color pairing intersects at two points on the chart. One of the mixtures is mixed with more of the color on the vertical axis while the other is painted with more of the color on the horizontal axis. Every mixture is painted with a loose gradient to provide as much information as possible. You can create even more combinations with different ratios paint and by mixing more than two colors at once.
Click the image above to view an enlarged version of the chart.
This link is an affiliate link in which Denise earns a commission of sales to help support her and her business.