My Colouring Book Collection

Adult colouring books are the currently popular, and I'm glad. I love colouring books!!
Because colouring books are so popular now, they're easy to purchase and they cover a lot of really cool categories (instead of just childrens stuff). You can purchase most of them online. I suggest browsing colouring books on Amazon to get an idea of what they look like, and reviews from customers, and then purchasing them through Book Depository (this option is better for Australians, because we can't buy items off Amazon without huge shipping fees, Book Depository is free).

See below for a look inside each book!

For costume colouring books, Dover Books and Creative Haven are great. You'll see a lot of costume books, because I love historical costumes so much!

Vampires, by Marty Noble

Dover Coloring Book

Marty Nobles designs are nice, I like the linework and the ability to create your own texture and shadowing when colouring the page. To be honest, some of the images are corny, but that's what vampires are like :)

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Godey's Fashions, by Ming-Ju Sun

Dover Coloring Book

Ming-Ju Sun illustrates a number of other Dover Coloring Books which are worth looking into. Godey's Fashions was adapted from Godey's Lady's Book, a 19th-century fashion magazine.

This colouring book has lovely illustrations, and descriptions of fashions on the bottom of the page. Lots of lovely Victorian fashions to colour-in!

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Empire Fashions, by Tom Tierney

Dover Coloring Book

Tom Tierney illustrates a lot of other fashion colouring books for Dover. Lots of details to colour, with a description of the fashions on the bottom of the page. The only problem I find with a lot of Tierney's artwork is that he colours a lot of hair black, so I can't make it a different colour.

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Late Edwardian and Victorian Fashions, by Tom Tierney

Dover Coloring Book

Another detail work by Tom Tierney. Black shading, and descriptions of fashions on the bottom page.

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Goddesses, by Mary Noble

Dover Coloring Book

This books contains illustrations of different goddesses from mythology, with a description of each along the bottom of the page. The artwork had a lot of open space and repeating linework.

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Victorian Fashions, by Tom Tierney

Dover Coloring Book

Even more Victorian fashions.

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Colonial and Early American Fashions, by Tom Tierney

Dover Coloring Book

Some nice 18th century dresses to colour!

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

French Baroque and Rococo Fashions, by Tom Tierney

Dover Coloring Book

So.. many.. ruffles.. Really nice book otherwise.

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Great Scenes from Horror Stories, by John Green

Dover Coloring Book

Scenes of horror illustrated with an excerpt on the bottom of the page. I really like the illustrations of this book.

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Renaissance Fashions, by Tom Tierney

Dover Coloring Book

More historical costumes! Lots of black shading :(

Cons: Printed on both sides of the page, common with all Dover Coloring Books.

Art Nouveau Fashions, by Ming-Ju Sun

Creative Haven

I wouldn't really classify this are Art Nouveau. More like, historical fashion with lots of flowers included. Still really nice though! Also, the pages are perforated so you can tear them out.

Also printed one side of the page!

Art Deco Fashions, by Ming-Ju Sun

Creative Haven

This book is similar to the previous one. Less Art Deco, more 1920s fashion with flowers included. Still lovely.

Printed one side, perforated pages.

American Beauties, by Carol Schmidt

Creative Haven

Really great illustrations of women in historical outfits, similar to Gibson Girls.

Printed one side, with perforated pages.

Art Nouveau Designs, by Ed Sibbett

Creative Haven

Art Nouveau/Mucha illustrations to colour.

Printed one side, perforated pages.

Magical Mandalas, by Alberta Hutchinson

Creative Haven

What colouring book collection is complete without a mandala book?

Printed one side, perforated pages.

The Official A Game of Thrones Colouring Book, by George R.R. Martin

I couldn't find any details of artists for this book. Reviews of this book are divided online, some don't enjoy the illustrations. I kind of agree with that, but overall I still like this book. A lot of the pages are dedicated to really weird drawings, such as the battle of blackwater (which I guess you'd colour in green due to the wildfire). I wish there were more illustrations of costumes. Many of the drawings are 'sketch' style instead of solid lines.

Descriptions of the page are written on the opposite side, which is nice.

The Bad Bones Clubs, by Laura Francis

I purchased this colouring book from Typo, a stationary shop in Australia. I don't think you can buy it online (don't quote me). Most, if not all, of the illustrations are skull themed. The only thing I dislike about this book is the repeating designs. I can imagine someone just copy+pasting most of the drawings. You can see this on the cover, where the skull the same just flipped over a number of times.

Enchanted Forest, by Johanna Basford

Lots of nice forest designs, but sadly everything is printed double page. Lots of detail to colour and find.

Decorative Arts Patterns to Colour, by Emily Bone, Hazel Maskell, Mary Klivert, and Liza Herzog

I would describe this as an activity book. This book teaches the basics of Art Nouveau and Art Deco, and the ways there they were used back in the early 1900s. Lots of detail to colour.

Cons: Printed both sides of the page.

Day of the Dead Coloring Book, by Thaneeya McArdle

This colouring book encourages additional designs to be drawn on the pages. Lots of the skulls are low detail, so they should be filled in with Mexican Day of the Dead designs.

Illustrations are printed on one side, with death quotes on the other.

Haunted Horror Pre-Code Cover Coloring Book, by Various artists

Pre-code refers to the time before comics were regulated and censored. The illustrations within this book are from many pre-code horror comic book covers. I love that they're printed on a single page, with the opposite page being a spooky head!

The only con of these illustrations is that there is a lot of black tone, which limits how much you're able to colour.

Tattoo Coloring Book 2, by Patience Coster

Lots of tattoo flash artwork to color in, each printed to one page.

Star Wars Coloring Book, by Catherine Saunier-Talec and Anne Vallet

Hardcover book with Art Nouveau inspired Star Wars illustrations. There are lots of pages with repeating patterns (like x-wings or wookies) and some really obscure characters also.

Cons: Printed both sides of the page.

Alphonse Mucha Coloring Book, by Gustave Baumann

Lovely Mucha illustrations, printed on one side of the page.

The Romanti-Goth AtoZ Coloring Book, by Heather Stanley

Simple illustrations of Goth items, from A to Z. I guess you can shade the items to make up for the lack of detail.

Cons: Printed both sides of the page.

Colour Me Mindful Enchanted Creatures, by Anastasia Catris

I really only got this book because I wanted to colour mermaids. I think this is my most disliked book in my collection, the pages are really tiny so it's hard to colour easily.

Cons: Tiny book, and printed both sides of the page.

Lastly, here is my coloured pencil collection, stored in my Harry Potter pencil case from High School. I use Faber Castell and Staedtler pencils. I also have a collection of felt pens.

I hope you enjoyed a look into my colouring book collection!