Portable Watercolour Palette Review: The UK Artist's Essential Sketchbook Companion

Urban sketching, plein air painting, and travel journalling have never been more popular in the UK — and they all share one essential requirement: a portable, practical palette that lets you mix and use watercolours anywhere. The 15-Well Portable Sketchbook Palette with Clip is designed precisely for this purpose: a compact, lightweight palette with 15 individual mixing wells and a clip that attaches directly to your sketchbook, keeping your palette and paper together and your hands free to paint.

The Clip System: A Game-Changer for Outdoor Painting

The clip mechanism is what makes this palette genuinely innovative. By attaching directly to the cover of your sketchbook, the palette and paper become a single, integrated unit — no need for a separate surface to rest your palette on, no risk of knocking it over, and no juggling between palette and sketchbook. This is particularly valuable for urban sketching and plein air painting where you're often standing or sitting in awkward positions without a stable surface.

15 Wells: Comprehensive Colour Mixing

The 15 individual wells provide ample space for a comprehensive working palette. Use individual wells for pure colours and combine adjacent wells for mixing — the well design keeps colours separate until you choose to mix them, preventing accidental contamination. Fifteen wells is enough for a full primary, secondary, and tertiary colour palette with room for earth tones and specialty colours.

Portable Design: Paint Anywhere

The compact, lightweight design makes this palette genuinely portable — it fits in a bag, a jacket pocket, or a small art kit without adding significant weight or bulk. This portability is what enables the spontaneous painting sessions that are at the heart of urban sketching and travel journalling.

Who Is This Palette For?

Urban Sketchers

The UK has a thriving urban sketching community, with groups meeting regularly in cities across the country to sketch architecture, street scenes, and everyday life. The clip palette is the ideal tool for this practice — portable, practical, and designed for use without a table or easel.

Travel Journallers

For those who document their travels with illustrated journals, a portable palette is essential. The clip system keeps palette and journal together, making it easy to add watercolour washes to sketches and notes on the go.

Plein Air Painters

Painting outdoors from life is one of the most rewarding artistic practices — and one of the most logistically challenging. The clip palette simplifies the setup, allowing you to focus on observation and painting rather than equipment management.

Beginners

For those new to watercolour, a portable palette with multiple wells makes it easy to set up a working palette of colours and begin experimenting without the complexity of a full studio setup.

Tips for Using Your Portable Palette

• Load wells with watercolour paint from tubes or pans and allow to dry — the dried paint reactivates with water when you're ready to paint
• Keep a small water brush or water container for activating and mixing colours
• Clean wells between sessions with a damp cloth to prevent colour contamination
• Use the larger mixing areas between wells for blending custom colours

Browse our full range of watercolour supplies and art accessories at TTPEN UK.

Paint anywhere, any time. Shop the 15-Well Portable Sketchbook Palette today.

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