R&F's Iridescent Color Line
R&F Handmade Paints makes eight iridescent paints, all of which are available in both our encaustic and Pigment Stick color lines®. If you haven’t begun exploring these yet, you are missing out.
When working with our iridescent color line, we recommend not extending them with much medium as that will tamp down the iridescence slightly. Designed to be standalone favorites, each of our metallic colors can be added to our transparent paints to create unique richly luminous colors.
Our metallic paints can also be added to opaque colors to add sheen and push color in cooler directions (with either Iridescent Silver, Iridescent German Silver, or Iridescent Pewter) or to provide a warm glow (with Ancient Gold, Iridescent Gold, and Iridescent brass). Iridescent Copper will change color more significantly, while Iridescent Pearl gives you a lovely metallic effect without impacting color.
Check out our newest video on YouTube (link below) to get a feel for how each of our metallic encaustic colors stack up against one another. While you’re there, don’t forget to like and comment on our demo videos, and be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel so you don’t miss any of our future videos.
Ancient Gold: A boldly metallic iridescent gold that demands its own space.
Pigment Stick Drying Rate: Slow
Classification: Synthetic Inorganic
Chemical Composition: metal oxides on mica
Iridescent Copper: It works beautifully with Mars Red since Copper is an iridescent version.
Pigment Stick Drying Rate: Medium
Classification: Synthetic Inorganic
Chemical Composition: metal oxides on mica
Iridescent Gold: Warmer and deeper than Brass, but with less green-yellow than Ancient Gold.
Pigment Stick Drying Rate: Slow
Classification: Synthetic Inorganic
Chemical Composition: metal oxides on mica
Iridescent Pewter: A dark bluish-grey metallic.
Pigment Stick Drying Rate: Slow
Classification: Synthetic Inorganic
Chemical Composition: metal oxides on mica
Iridescent Brass: Cool, light, and yellowish with a hint of sheen and shimmer.
Pigment Stick Drying Rate: Slow
Classification: Synthetic Inorganic
Chemical Composition: metal oxides on mica
Iridescent German Silver: A warm deep silver, lighter than Pewter, but darker then Silver.
Pigment Stick Drying Rate: Slow
Classification: Synthetic Inorganic
Chemical Composition: metal oxides on mica
Iridescent Pearl: Has the look of crushed pearls. Adds iridescence without color to other paints.
Pigment Stick Drying Rate: Slow
Classification: Synthetic Inorganic
Chemical Composition: metal oxides on mica
Iridescent Silver: A richly warm antique silver.
Pigment Stick Drying Rate: Slow
Classification: Synthetic Inorganic
Chemical Composition: metal oxides on mica
Dietlind Vander Schaaf, Seerose, 30” x 30”, encaustic, Pigment Stick, metallic foil, and 23 karat gold leaf on panel, 2022.
Dietlind Vander Schaaf uses both real 23 karat gold leaf and R&F’s Ancient Gold encaustic paint to achieve richly reflective surfaces in her paintings, such as Seerose.
Lorraine Glessner, Vermont Views: Blues #4, 9.5” x 13”, encaustic monoprint on rice paper, 2022
Lorraine Glessner enjoys working with Ancient Gold in combination with Cobalt Blue for monoprints.
Leslie Giuiani, Caterpiggle, embroidery on encaustic painting on Encausticflex, 10” x 8”.
Leslie Giuliani creates iridescent backgrounds using our metallic color line. She has two great demo videos on YouTube showing how you can achieve silver leaf effects and gold leaf effects.