Schmincke Signature Edition Colors 2025

Schmincke, the legendary German color house, is always in conversation with artists. From its early history in the 19th century, Schmincke has made custom colors at the request of individual artists. Today, the company frequently collaborates with artists to develop new and special colors; Signature Edition watercolors represent the best of these encounters.

This bundle includes all five Signature Edition colors for 2025:

COLOGNE BRIDGE GREEN, made in collaboration between Schmincke and watercolorist Dirk Schmitt. It's a light, muted green that's actually made from a highly complex five-pigment mixture. The color is meant for giving an instant patina to weathered objects in your paintings — think of the oxidized and variegated color of a metal bridge.

WILD PURPLE, a Signature Edition watercolor made in collaboration with Vitas Artworks. It's a semi-opaque, dramatically granulating pink-violet, rich in color and versatile in effect. It's great for creating dramatic backgrounds, especially with natural subjects like people and landscapes. Mix with a touch of blue for a convincing shadow color.

ATOLL BLUE, a much-requested, intensely bright turquoise color. This difficult-to-photograph color lies outside the standard RGB color space that's used in computer monitors, so it looks much more saturated and greenish in real life.

SHADOW GREY, made in collaboration between Schmincke and Anna@draw_better. It's a cool, deep greyish blue that's dense and dark when used at full strength, but cool and more bluish when diluted. It's perfect for shadows on white surfaces, clouds, snow, and stone architecture.

BUFF TITANIUM, one of the all-time most-requested colors from artists around the world. Made from a very similar molecule as Titanium White, Buff Titanium is a warm, subtle off-white that is difficult to mix from other pigments. It's extremely useful in landscape and portrait painting, especially as a mixing color that lightens while adding earthy complexity.

Five 15 mL tubes, each in a Schmincke Signature Edition box. Made in Germany.

Available for a limited time only.

About Schmincke Horadam Watercolors:

Schmincke Horadam watercolors are among the world's finest professional-grade colors. First patented in 1892 by Schmincke co-founder Josef Horadam and continuously improved over more than a century of effort, Horadam watercolors are vibrant, smooth, and easy to apply to any kind of watercolor paper. Only the best artist pigments are used for the 140 colors that make up today's Horadam lineup. They're milled until the paint becomes creamy and utterly consistent, and each color shines in its pan when water is applied.

Even the process of filling Horadam pans is special. Each pan is liquid-filled from the same watercolor that's in Horadam tubes, then allowed to dry four times in a process that takes several weeks from start to finish. The result is an incredibly concentrated dry pan that reactivates instantly when you touch it with a wet brush. Scrub a little bit and you'll have intense color, ready to apply to your notebook or pad.