Clara Rivers

I've been painting with watercolor since my second year at the Pacific Northwest College of Art, where I studied under botanical illustrator Dana Levy and developed the slow, observational practice that still defines my work today. After graduating with a BFA in Illustration in 2008, I began teaching community workshops while building a freelance illustration client base.

By 2012 I was running 4–6 watercolor workshops per month in Portland — everything from beginner day intensives to multi-week botanical studies courses. Teaching forced me to engage with instructional books at a deeper level: I had to know not just whether a technique worked, but whether it could be communicated clearly enough for a complete beginner to follow on their first try.

I started BestWatercolorBooks in 2019 after realizing that most online book recommendations were essentially republished publisher blurbs. Every recommendation I've made since has come from buying the book, working through it, and deciding whether I'd hand it to one of my own students.