The Coronation of a Monarch is full of pomp and ceremony and the crowning of King Charles III will be no different. For me, it will be the first time to see the coronation of a British Royal, but for some, who witnessed his mother’s in 1953, it will be their second. It is too this end, that I set about creating a set of six professional quality watercolours that would reflect this auspicious occasion and be full of symbolic meaning.

The fact that the gift set will be watercolours is fitting, as HRH Charles III is an accomplished watercolourist and honorary member of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours. I first saw some of his work during an exhibition of the Royal Institute at the Mall Galleries in 1997 and remember seeing photographs of the then Prince of Wales painting whilst on holiday at Balmoral. Hopefully he will still have time to relax and paint and maybe even try some of my watercolours.



Figure 1: The Coronation 2023 emblem designed by Sir Jony Ive KBE, incorporating the colours of the Union flag; red, white and blue. 

Since announcing the date of the Coronation, many suppliers to the retail companies have been producing special gifts and even an emblem is available to use free of charge for all activities, events and merchandising associated with the event (see figure 1). I also consider to produce a special watercolour gift for the occasion and so set about defining the colours I would include.  

I had previously used three special colours as part of the Platinum Jubilee set, where I wanted a blue and red that matched the colours of the Union flag (see figure 2) and created a gold watercolour, to symbolise the crown. I decided to include these three colours in my Coronation set and so set about looking for another three, that would be equally symbolic.



Figure 2: The Union Flag painted using Regal Red and Royal Blue for the sleeve design for the Platinum Jubilee gift set

Symbolic is quite an interesting concept, especially when looking for colours that represent meaning, but what meaning should I be looking to symbolise?

In other words, what was going to be the underlining them of my set, one that would continue well after the King had been crowned and the celebrations, a distant memory. It was at this point I started to think about the Royal family and what they might regard as an important symbol of the Coronation. One thought led to another and finally I came up with the idea of the colours of the United Kingdom. So, what colours best symbolise each of the four geographic and historical Kingdoms of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland?

Well, there is the red white and blue of the Union flag, including the of the cross of St George and the blue of St Andrew. The yellow of the Welsh daffodils worn on St David’s day and the background of the Royal Standard. The red of the English rose and Welsh dragon. The green associated with the Emerald Isle, shamrock and the green found on the Welsh flag. The violet of the Scottish thistle and not to mention the abundance of coloured threads of Scottish tartan. 

Then what of HRH Charles III himself, what colours best symbolise him?  The gold and purple of the crown he will wear or the colours of the Royal Standard, blue, red and a rich golden yellow. In the end I settled for six colours, which I believe instil the colour essence of the Coronation and celebrates the United Kingdom too (see figure 3). 

Figure 3: The A J Ludlow Professional Watercolours, presented in the Limited Edition Gift Sets to celebrate the Coronation of King Charles III.

The six special colours, I finally chose for their association with the Crown and the United Kingdom are:

• Regal Red - a cadmium based red, its colour is closely associated with the red rose of England, the Welsh Dragon and the red colour of the flag of St George and the Union flag;

• Imperial Purple - a strong organic purple, whose colour resembles the velvet of the Crown Charles will wear when he is crowned;

• Royal Blue - a rich, strong violet shade blue, chosen for its association with the blue in the Union Flag and St Andrew’s Flag;

• Seamair Green – a beautiful yellow shade green, its name derived from the Irish tongue, (meaning shamrock or young clover and pronounced SHAM-ur). This colour was chosen as it is closely associated with the giving and receiving of shamrock on St Patrick’s Day.

• Sovereign Gold – one of the two metallic-effect gold watercolours presented in this gift set, the colour of this is a reddish gold hue;

• Celtic Gold - the other metallic-effect gold watercolour presented in this gift set, the colour of this is a lemon gold hue. Both golds symbolise the St Edward's Crown, which King Charles III will wear when he is officially declared as King during his Coronation.

My next task was to distilling all these ideas into a painting that I could use as artwork for the gift set sleeve and label design. I opted to paint a shamrock, thistle, rose and dragon in the four corners, with St Edward’s crown in the centre, superimposed on a Union flag as shown in figures 4. Figure 5 shows the work in progress in my studio and figure 6 is the finished painting.



Figure 4: The four “Kingdoms” are done, just adding details to the Crown of St Edward

Figure 5: A work in progress. The artist and author in his studio.



Figure 6: “A United Kingdom”, a watercolour painting by Andrew Ludlow, using only the six Special Limited Edition Colours.

And finally……