How I Plan a Textured Art Painting (Step-by-Step)

February 15, 2026

Many of my textured artworks start from a very simple idea. I often get the inspiration often from nature.

In this post, I wanted to show you how that initial spark of inspiration turns into a finished painting, step by step. I'll use my Fall Foliage painting as an example, as it's one of my more popular and colourful works.

What You'll Learn:

How I get ideas for textured art
How I plan the texture and composition
How to create the Fall Foliage step by step (video tutorial in the end)

Where the Idea Came From

The original idea came to me on a simple walk in the woods with our dog in early autumn. On the path, there were two trees that had already turned completely yellow, whereas the others were still lush green.

I loved that contrast, and wanted to turn it into a textured painting. I took a photo (which you see below), and when I returned to my studio I started planning.

yellow-orange trees surrounded by green trees on a forest path

Planning the Texture and Composition

There were three elements I wanted to capture from the scene: movement, depth and colours.

For movement, I wanted the painting to resemble the idea of falling leaves.

For depth, I wanted the painting to feel like a deep, lush forest.

And of course with the colours, I wanted to capture the beautiful palette of the fall foliage (which is my favourite time of the year).

Beginner Tip: If you are new to textured art, check out my post "How to Start Textured Art (Beginner-Guide)"

Creating the Artwork

The sense of movement was achieved with brushwork and textured patterns. The background consists of several layers of acrylic paint, applied in short strokes that mimic falling leaves.

These layers also helped build up the sense of depth I was after. As colours, I used a range of reds and yellows on the top part, and greens on the bottom (my favourites being Vermilion Red, Medium Yellow and Sap Green)

Fall Foliage (100x81 cm), process photo. Original artwork by Henri Hagelberg

Similarly with the textured patterns. I coloured the texture paste directly with the acrylic paints, and applied the textures to resemble the movement of the falling leaves.

To make the artwork feel even more organic, I used different sized palette knives and made some of the petals imperfect.

(This also makes this design forgiving for beginners: it looks better when not polished and perfect.)

Some of the textures were layered on top of each other, to further create the sense of depth.

Together the different background colour layers brushed in short strokes followed by several textured layers in a similar pattern created the sense of depth and movement I was going for. That's how Fall Foliage came to life.

Fall Foliage, original textured art by Henri Hagelberg

Letting the Texture Dry

The Fall Foliage is quite time-consuming to create because you place each petal by hand. The larger versions (120x100 cm and 150x100 cm) I have done over multiple sessions.

You do not need to finish the painting in one go. It does not matter if part of the petals dry, you can just continue working on it.

Once fully finished with the textures, it is important to allow them to properly dry. Drying time depends on the thickness of the paste and the temperature. With a painting like this, I would wait by minimum 24 hours, preferrably more.

The Materials I Used

a canvas
texture paste
Palette knives
Acrylic Paints
Paintbrush
Varnish (optional, don't worry about it if this is your first painting)

For the textures, I use my own textuuri texture paste. If you are creating a larger version, I would recommend at least 2 jars. When I created the 150x100 cm Fall Foliage, I used 3 jars in total. You can find it here: textuuri texture paste

Watch the Full Process

In this video, you can see the full process from start to finish. If you want to try this technique yourself, start simple and don't worry about mistakes. The key thing is to get creating.

What Next?

If you want to learn textured art, I share short tutorials and tips also by email. You can join from the form below.

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