Payne's Grey

Colour Index: PB27, PR209, PY43

Transparency: Transparent

Granulation: Slight Granulation

Lightfastness: Excellent

Range: Historic Colour Range

It pairs particularly well with:

Burnt Umber: for rich charcoal greys, weathered wood and earthy shadow tones.

Ultramarine: for deep storm clouds, dramatic sea tones and cool shadow mixtures.

Italian Cold Ochre – producing muted olive greens and atmospheric countryside colours.

Ferrous & Bone's Payne's Grey is a handcrafted professional watercolour inspired by the original blue-grey mixture developed by the eighteenth-century English watercolourist William Payne. Rather than relying on the starkness of black, Payne created a beautifully balanced grey that offered artists a more natural way to paint shadows, atmosphere and subtle tonal variation.

Handmade in small batches, our Payne's Grey follows closely to the original mix and delivers the exceptional handling and pigment performance expected by today's professional artists. It's transparent nature makes it ideal for glazing, allowing luminous layers to build depth without sacrificing the brilliance of underlying colours. A gentle granulation adds character and texture, while its remarkable tonal range moves effortlessly from delicate silver-grey washes to rich, dramatic darks.

An indispensable colour for landscape, architectural and botanical painting, Payne's Grey excels at creating atmospheric skies, distant hills, reflective water and nuanced shadows. It offers a softer, more sophisticated alternative to black and has long been considered an essential colour in every serious watercolour palette.

Every Ferrous & Bone watercolour is handcrafted using the finest artist-grade pigments and carefully selected ingredients, producing colours renowned for their richness, handling and permanence.