If there is one subject that draws beginners to watercolour more than any other, it is loose florals — those free, atmospheric paintings where flowers seem to bloom spontaneously from the paper with barely a brushstroke in sight. The secret is not talent or years of practice; it is understanding what loose painting actually means and deliberately working in a way that allows watercolour to do what it does naturally. In this beginner's walkthrough we cover the full process: how to think about composition before you start, why your brush size matters more than your drawing ability, how to work wet-on-wet to create the soft petal blooms that define the style, how to paint leaves and stems that anchor the composition, and — crucially — how to know when to stop before you overwork it. We include four colour palette suggestions for different moods from soft and romantic to bold and vibrant, a guide to painting roses loosely, and a straight-talking list of the mistakes that trip up almost every beginner at this subject. Read on, then find everything you need in store or at craftandcanvas.co.uk.

Brushes are one of the most confusing areas of the art supplies market for beginners — too many options, too little guidance on what actually matters, and a very wide range of quality for superficially similar products. In this guide we cut through all of that with a practical, plain English explanation of what you actually need to get started with acrylic painting and how to build your collection from there. We cover the six essential brush shapes and what each one is for, the key difference between Taklon and synthetic hog bristle and when each is appropriate, and a clear guide to the four brush ranges we stock at Craft and Canvas: Pro Arte Acrylix for precise, controlled acrylic work; Pro Arte Bristlene for expressive, textural painting and as a vegan hog hair alternative; Royal and Langnickel Taklon for responsive, affordable all-round use; and PAB Florence, the Florentine brush maker founded in 1911 whose artist brushes represent the finest quality available. Read on, then find the full range in store or at craftandcanvas.co.uk.

Most watercolour painters have a handful of brands they know and trust, and Wallace Seymour is rarely among them — not because the paints are inferior, but because they are deliberately produced in small quantities, supplied only through independent retailers, and never marketed through the mainstream trade. Founded in 2011 by Rebecca Wallace and Pip Seymour, two practising British artists, the company makes the Vintage Watercolours range the way watercolour was made before the industry scaled up and cut corners — traditional and historic mineral pigments, Kordofan Gum Arabic of the highest grade, and genuine Acacia honey from a single Italian estate. The colour range includes pigments you simply cannot buy elsewhere: finite stocks of historic colours unavailable since the 1980s, earth pigments hand-dug from specific English quarries, and rare minerals with granulation qualities that synthetic pigments cannot replicate. We stock the full Series A, B, and C tube range at Craft and Canvas in Hebden Bridge. Read on for the full story, then come in and find out more.