What to know before trying jelly gouache

One of the most frequent questions I hear from passersby as I’m painting is “What’s that stuff you’re using?” It’s jelly gouache (pronounced “gwash”)! As far as I can tell, this is a newly-developed medium. I saw illustrators using it on Instagram and simply had to try it. Since then it’s become my go-to medium for a variety of projects, but it’s not without flaws. (I’m not paid/incentivized to promote/review this product, btw.)

TL;DR:

1. Mark the cups before you move them
2. Expect maintenance to prevent mold
3. Palettes may be unbalanced
4. Full paint sets are heavy
5. Opacity isn’t guaranteed

Mark the cups before you move them!

Large square-cupped sets like the Himi set that I use come with a reference sheet to tell you which colors belong where, but there are no marks on the cups themselves. The first thing I did (after painstakingly peeling off all the film covers) was mark all the cups in a grid. This keeps the colors from leaking into each other so much when stored, because paint WILL transfer to the lid and create a muddy mess if you’re not consistent with color placement.

Naming the tubs like this is also helpful for making color swatch charts for yourself, and for picking out palettes for a project. You can easily identify the color you used by its grid placement.

You’ll have to maintain your paints

If you don’t treat these paints with an anti-mold solution every 4-6 weeks, expect them to become disgusting (I let it happen once. Never again 😬). Similarly, treating them on this schedule helps keep their nice yogurty consistency. Expect to spend 30 min or so every month-ish on pure maintenance to keep jelly gouache usable.

My process for maintaining the paints is:

1. Open the set and mist it with Himi gouache spray
2. Mix each cup with a palette knife, misting the whole set with water occasionally as cups dry up
3. After mixing, mist all the cups once more with gouache spray
4. Before closing the set, mist the lid with gouache spray

Doing the above once per month has kept my paint set moist, usable, and mold-free. The maintenance process leaves a bit of a paint puddle on my desk; I’d advise spraying down the palette on top of something you don’t mind getting messy.

Pre-chosen palettes might be ill-suited to your color needs

The chosen palette in the Himi 112-color set has an unnecessary variety of pastel purples, and a shocking lack of reds. I always find myself mixing new greens as well, because when painting outside there’s so much more variety of green that this palette doesn’t capture.

These sets are heavy!

All this paint and moisture are a lot to lug around. I still take the full set with me to plein air competitions because I appreciate the convenience of selecting from a large pre-mixed palette, and I know I won’t be far from my car. But when I’m on the trail or in the city, the larger set stays home and I select a premeditated palette to carry in a more portable kit. I’ve bought two smaller Himi jelly gouache kits specifically for their compact size.

Opacity has its limits

One of the things I love about using gouache is that it carries some of the best qualities of both watercolor and acrylic. Like watercolor, you can dilute the paint for transparent washes and flowing gradients. You can bring up dried paint by rewetting it, and rehydrate mixed colors that dried in your palette. Like acrylic, you can layer paint opaquely overtop of previous dry layers; so it’s much more forgiving than standard watercolor. But be warned that some colors don’t layer nicely over others; after the top layer dries, it’s sometimes surprising how strongly the bottom shows through, depending on the color.

Enjoy!

Despite my gripes, I’ve found painting with jelly gouache to meld extremely well with an illustrative style. Happy painting 🙂