Welcome to Women in Watercolor’s blog newsletter, Women in Watercolor Working Together!

Entry is OPEN

Entry is OPEN for the 7th Annual 2026 Women in Watercolor International Juried Competition. You can enter five paintings total, and they can ALL WIN prizes!

Over $17,000 in cash prizes, plus THOUSANDS MORE in merchandise prizes and awards! The FULL PROSPECTUS for the 2026 contest is on the website NOW.

You can find more details in both the prospectus and the frequently asked questions section on the website.

Entry Info: https://womeninwatercolor.com/annual-international-juried-competition/

Prospectus: https://womeninwatercolor.com/women-in-watercolor-prospectus/

FAQ Page: https://womeninwatercolor.com/frequently-asked-questions-faq/

Meet the 2026 Awards Judges

You can see more about them on the website: https://womeninwatercolor.com/2026-awards-judges/

Where in the World

Where in the World is Your Women in Watercolor Award

Women in Watercolor is having a fun contest called, “Where in the World is Your Women in Watercolor Award?”. All you have to do to enter is post a photo of your award on Instagram, Facebook or both. The more creative you get with your photo the better; and the more photos you post, the greater your chances to win! Don’t forget we would love to see you, your painting, or where you live in it as well.

How to Enter:

1. Post a photo on Instagram or Facebook of Where in the World Your Award is. You are eligible to enter the contest if you won ANY award in any of the WIW Juried or Members Shows or were an Awards Judge. You can enter with your gold coin award, award ribbon and/or your award certificate (emailed awards printed out at home work too). Make sure you add Where in the World the photo was taken in your post.

2. Follow Women in Watercolor on Instagram and/or Facebook

Instagram: @WomenInWatercolor and Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/womeninwatercolor

3. TAG the photo @WomenInWatercolor and use hashtags #wiwawardchallenge and #whereintheworld

You can also find the full rules for the contest on the Women in Watercolor website.

What You Win:

The best photos posted on social media will be added to the WIW website!
The best photos will also be posted on the Women in Watercolor Facebook and Instagram pages with a link to you/your page as well.

More Details:

You may enter as many times as you would like with different photos. Get creative and show us where these awards are now! We would love to see you or your painting in the photo as well, but you don’t have to. Make sure you add Where in the World the photo was taken in your post and TAG Women in Watercolor so we see it.

By posting your image and tagging WIW you are giving permission for us to share your photo on our social media and website.

I give full credit for the idea of this kind of contest to amazing watercolor artist Leslie Lambert @leslielambertfineart, who did this with her beautiful Watercolor 365 book. It was just such a genius and fun idea I had to do it with our Women in Watercolor awards.

I hope you will enter and have fun with this contest!

Sincerely,

Lynn D. Pratt

President of Women in Watercolor

Painting to Standard Sizes

By Lynn D Pratt

Creating art is expensive. Getting artwork framed is even more expensive. A good way to save money and make your life a lot easier is to paint to standard sizes. This way you can make your paintings fit right into standard size mats and frames. You can also cut all of your painting boards (that you attach your paper to while painting) to standard sizes as well, so it’s easy to tape or staple your painting down without having the board take up extra space on your desk or need 100 boards of random sizes.

A common problem is that watercolor paper does not come in these standard sizes. I have included a downloadable guide so you can buy full sheet watercolor paper, 22”x30”, and rip/cut it down to all of the sizes you need. I have multiple layouts depending on the size you want to paint to while wasting the least amount of paper. And remember, all the scrap paper you do end up with is perfect to test out colors on, so don’t throw any away. I also try to keep the watermark off the paper that I use, so it’s not on one of my paintings, so make sure you know where it is before you start ripping.

I have included a second downloadable guide that shows the standard mat and frame sizes that you can get most places. It also shows you the layout for your board size, compared to paper size, to painting size and how to tape it down. I suggest making your watercolor paper ½” larger on each side than the final painting size you want. That way you can tape down your paper to your board on all sides easily and always have that nice white edge if you don’t frame your painting. It also keeps your paper from buckling with wet-into-wet washes.

You always want a little play on the sides of the painting that will go under a mat, so the white paper edges don’t show. Standard mat openings usually give you ¼” overlap around all the edges, so plan your paintings accordingly so nothing gets cut off when framing.

If you sell your art, it also makes it easier for your collectors because if they buy an unframed painting, they can easily pop it into a store-bought mat and frame, and they don’t have to pay a lot for custom framing. This is a big deal for most buyers.

When matting and framing make sure you use all archival or at minimum acid free mats, tapes and backing boards, so they do not yellow or ruin your paintings over time.

I hope this helps simplify the process for you, so you spend more time painting and less time doing everything else!

You can get the FREE downloadable and printable guides here: M#6- FREE: Standard Sizes for Paintings | Patreon

You can see the exact tape, matting and all the materials that I use and find the links here:

My Materials – Lynn D. Pratt Watercolors

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Edited by Lynn D. Pratt

Women in Watercolor was created to help encourage, support, and promote the outstanding women that are working in this medium on an international level.

Through online competitions, and in-person events we will work together to build each other up, learn from each other and increase our individual and overall success.