Zentangle Dog Coloring Page

This zentangle dog coloring page fills a sitting dog with closed patterns, part by part. The neck and chest hold rows of round scales and nested hexagons, the belly runs in wavy bands, and a large flower blooms on the hip. Leaves cover the long ear, tiny rings wrap the paws, and a beaded collar holds a star tag. Behind the dog, a sun of petals and small squares circles the whole figure.

This is a page for teens and adults. The cells are small, and there are hundreds of them. It works well as a slow project that you pick up for ten minutes at a time, and there is no rush to finish.

Planning your colors

Pattern pages can get noisy fast, so choose your colors before you begin. Here are three plans that hold together well.

• Cool plan: blues on the upper body, teal on the belly, purple on the ear, and a warm orange only on the hip flower.
• Warm plan: red, orange and yellow across the dog, with pale blue in the sun behind it.
• Two color plan: pick one color plus black, then shade each pattern lighter or darker. It looks very smart.

Try testing your colors on the bones and hearts in the corners first. They are small and easy to fix, and they show you how your pens behave on your paper.

Zentangle dog coloring page tips

Work from the top of the dog down, so your hand does not smear what you have done. Finish one pattern before moving to the next. If you jump around, it's easy to lose track of which cells are which.

In any pattern with an inner shape, such as the hexagons, color the rings one color and leave the centers white. White gaps stop a page from looking too heavy. On the scales, try going darker from row to row. That small change gives the chest a soft, rounded look.

Keep the background calm. Pale colors in the petals and ring will help the dog stand out, and so will a plain peach or cream on the rest of the sheet. The floor bands at the bottom can pick up one color from the dog, which ties the picture together.

Where the style comes from

The Zentangle Method was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. It is a simple way of drawing structured patterns, and many people use it to relax. You can read about it on the Zentangle website. This coloring page is inspired by that look, with the patterns drawn for you, so you can go straight to the color.

Make it your own

Print a copy on a heavier sheet and add your own marks with a fine black pen. Put dots in the empty sun, or add small lines inside the leaves. Then frame it. A finished page looks lovely in a plain white mat, and it makes a thoughtful gift for a dog owner.

For an art class, ask each student to invent one new pattern and draw it inside a blank paper dog. Hang them in a row on the wall. Everyone starts with the same shape, and no two will match.

Take a moment to look at how the patterns meet. Each band stops at a clean line, so you can treat the neck, the belly and the hip as separate small pictures. Finish one, rest your hand, and come back.

Paper and tools

Use the heaviest paper your printer takes. Fine tip markers give crisp color in small cells, while sharp pencils let you blend. Keep a sharpener close. Plan on two or three short sittings.

If you enjoyed this one, the zentangle cat coloring page uses the same closed patterns. For a quieter pattern page, print the mandala art coloring page.

Questions