How To Make Purple Paint At Home From Scratch!

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The color purple is seeing a huge spike in its popularity for both arts and crafts as well as home decor right now as more and more people start to follow the trend. If the last year or so is anything to go by, the trend of using purple is going to keep growing for a while yet and so are the number of questions that we see each month from people reaching out for advice on regarding purple.

As people are starting to try and gain as much control over their paint palettes as possible by creating their colors from base colors or even just the primary colors, it is not surprising that we see so many people reaching out to ask about how to make purple paint. Thankfully though, purple is one of the easier colors to make and it is very beginner friendly for people to learn how to mix it to get various popular shades of purple with ease.

Due to seeing such a wide range of questions specific to how you are able to make purple paint at home, we have decided to try and include as many of them as possible in this article to help our readers better understand the various ways that they are able to create purple. Depending on exactly what you want to know, you can find specific sections of our article below in our table of contents and click it to instantly be taken to that section to save yourself some time.

How To Make Purple Paint At Home!

To make purple paint at home, you simply have to mix red and blue paint together. Thankfully, the vast majority of people will have a red and blue paint in their collection and be able to make any shade of purple paint that they require with ease. Although you can take this a step further by adding in very small amounts of white or black paint to adjust the shade of purple, it usually won’t be needed.

As both blue and red are primary colors, the vast majority of decent entry level paint sets will contain a red or blue paint unless you are going with a specialist set. Even then, the vast majority of specialist paint sets will have some form of a red paint and a blue paint in it that you are able to use to make purple.

You have to keep in mind though that the hues and shades of the red and purple paint that you mix will have a direct effect on the resulting purple paint that you make. Mixing a pale red with a dark blue or visa versa will usually not work so try to make sure the shades of your red and blue are similar to get the best possible purple as your end result.

What Colors Make Purple?

The best colors to make purple are a simple red and a simple blue paint mixed together in equal parts. You can add very small amounts of white or black paint to change the specific shade of the purple paint you make but this is usually not required. You can use some other colors if needed to make some unique purples but this will not be required for the vast majority of people.

Due to only requiring two base colors as well as the vast majority of decent entry level paint sets coming with a suitable red and a suitable blue for making your own purple, everyone from a beginner all the way up to a professional level painter can mix purple. Some of the more unique colors that we see people reaching out and asking for advice on may require four or even five base colors to mix in very specific ratios making them very hard.

Thankfully, adding red and blue in equal parts and then mixing the two will almost always result in a nice purple color making it one of the easiest colors to make. Making your own purple paint at home can be a solid option for many people to learn the basics of mixing colors and color matching during the mixing process though. As you start to add in a third or even fourth color, the process becomes considerably more difficult in most cases so starting with a color like purple with two base colors can be a great starting place if you are wanting to make as many of your paint colors from scratch as possible.

How To Make Purple With Primary Colors!

Making homemade purple paint using only primary colors is very simple. Add your red and blue primary colors to a mixing container in equal parts and mix the two color together thoroughly to get a solid purple color. This is one of the quickest, easiest, and cheapest ways to make your own purple paint at home and it is very beginner friendly.

If you have ran out of your blue paint or red paint from your paint collection then both color options can easily be found online with minimal effort for a low price. With both blue and red being very popular colors for painting as well as being used heavily in the mixing process for many other colors due to being primary colors, it will be common for you to run out of them and have to restock them.

If you want, you are able to slightly adjust the ratios of the red and blue paint that you add to your mixing containers though and create slightly different shades of purple. This can be done intentionally to create a slightly different shade of purple or simply due to not having enough paint left of your red or blue paint for the mixing process.

How To Make Dark Purple Paint!

The easiest way to make a dark purple paint is to add a blue and red paint in equal parts until you create a normal purple color and then add a touch of black paint to the purple and then mix everything together again. Depending on how dark you want your purple, you may have to add a little more black after the initial amount but always add the black paint in small amounts to avoid it overwhelming your purple.

If you have the colors available then a quicker and easier two color method for making dark purple paint is adding permanent rose and cerulean blue in equal parts and then mixing them. This tends to give a beautiful dark purple that is very versatile and has a large number of different use cases.

In our opinion, taking the permanent rose and cerulean blue path is often the best route for making your own dark purple paint at home as the end result often has a better look and feel to it. On top of that, you are also easily able to adjust the exact shade of the purple using that method by adding slightly more permanent rose or cerulean blue to the mix for custom tweaks to your taste.

How To Make Light Purple Paint!

The easiest way to make a light purple paint color is to mix blue and red paint in equal parts to create your base purple and then add a touch of white to the purple and mix it again. If the purple is not light enough for you then you can add a touch more white and remix it repeating this process over and over until it meets your taste.

In our opinion, a decent titanium white is the best option for this process and should offer you a suitable light purple with minimal effort being required on your part. We would always recommend that you add the white to the purple in small amounts so you have more control over just how light the purple will be.

You are also able to use a light grey or even a very pale yellow to make a light purple but this can often have unwanted side effects slightly changing the purple more than most people would want. This is why we always recommend that our readers simply stick to using a white paint to lighten a purple to keep everything as simple and straight forward as possible.

How To Make Bright Purple Paint!

Making a bright purple paint can be achieved by mixing ultramarine blue and alizarin crimson in equal parts. This tends to be the quickest, easiest, and cheapest method to make a brilliantly bright purple due to the hues of the ultramarine blue and alizarin crimson suiting a bright purple very well.

If you don’t carry the two base colors in your collection currently then both ultramarine blue and alizarin crimson are able to be picked up online for cheap. There are a number of brands who produce the colors due to there being a solid demand for both as stand alone colors although both are very helpful when making other colors too.

Although there are other colors that you are able to use to make your own bright purple paint, we usually don’t recommend them as the process tends to become more complex. Alizarin crimson is pretty much set in stone on the red side of the palette but you are able to get a similar result by switching out the ultramarine blue for a phthalo blue but the resulting purple tends not to be as bright in most cases.

How To Make Purple Acrylic Paint!

You are able to make your own purple acrylic paint at home from scratch by adding a suitable purple pigment to some gesso to use as the acrylic base. An easier and more popular method is to simply mix red and blue acrylic paints in equal parts to make a purple acrylic paint.

More and more people are starting to want to make their own paints from scratch as part of the arts and crafts process so adding some purple pigment to some gesso is usually the best route to take to create purple acrylic paint from scratch. Although it can take a little getting used to as well as a bunch of trial and error, once you get the hand of it, the process becomes quick and easy.

The majority of people, especially beginners will find it much easier to just mix some blue acrylic paint with some red acrylic paint in equal parts to create their purple acrylic paint though. This is one of the quickest and easiest methods to make purple paint and is usually our default recommendation to our readers.

How To Make Purple Oil Paint!

You are able to make purple oil paint at home from scratch by adding a suitable purple pigment to a suitable oil medium such as linseed oil. An easier method is to mix a blue oil paint with a red oil paint in equal parts though allowing you to quickly and easily make your own purple oil paint art home.

The key to making your own purple oil paint is to try and ensure that the purple pigment you choose to use for the process is fine enough to be suspended in the oil medium that you choose, we recommend linseed oil. If the purple pigment is too dense then it will fall through the oil and require you to shake the mixture up every time you wish to use your home made purple oil paint.

If you are a beginner or just want a quick, easy, and cheap solution to make your purple oil paint then mixing some blue oil paint with some red oil paint will almost always be the better option to take. You are able to customise the shade of the purple paint that you create more using this method too scoring it points over the purple pigment method.

How To Make Purple Watercolor Paint!

You are able to make your own purple water color paint at home from scratch by adding a suitable purple pigment to a suitable medium such as gum arabic. You are also able to mix a red water color paint with a blue water color paint in equal parts to make your own purple water color paint too.

We usually recommend against using the purple pigment method as it can be a nightmare to get the pigment to set correctly in the gum arabic. Even a very fine grained purple pigment that would be fine for making any other type of paint will end up having issues and if you do make your own purple water color paint in this way, you usually have to use it quickly before it spoils.

The majority of people will be much better off by just adding a red watercolor paint to a blue watercolor paint in equal parts to create their purple water color paint. This offers more control over the outcome and shade of the purple paint that you create too allowing you to quickly and easily tweak its exact color to meet your needs and taste.

Conclusion

That brings our article going over how to make purple paint at home to an end. We have gone over a number of different methods that you are able to use to use to make purple paint for different paint types with some methods being quick and easy with very common colors to some more complex methods too. All are suitable for different use cases and needs so trying to match what you need to the method of actually making your own purple is probably the best route to take.