How to draw a Mandala in 5 easy steps.

Hello everyone!

Learning how to draw a #Mandala is really simple and so much fun.

What is a Mandala?

The word Mandala is derived from the Sanskrit word meaning "circle". It is often defined as the spiritual symbol in Hinduism and Buddhism. It represents the universe and brings enlightenment to everything in it.

Mandala drawings are always therapeutic and it gives you the enriched experience. The shapes, colors, patterns everything you use in constructing a Mandala define who you are and what you feel at that moment.

Mandalas are used as tools for meditation. It helps you to understand what you have deep down inside you. Across the globe, Mandalas are used in various spiritual practices.

The best part about drawing Mandala is that there are no black and white rules. It gives complete freedom to express anything and everything you want to share. You also ghee freedom to choose whichever shape, pattern, design, or colors you want for your Mandala.

Let's get started!

I'm gonna show you how I made this Mandala using just two shapes. Although it kinda looks complicated it's actually very simple and once you get to know the idea of drawing a Mandala then you'll love this process.

Materials needed:

Mechanical pencil (Classmate)

Eraser (Apsara)

Ruler / Scale

Protractor

Procircle

Compass (Steadtler)

Pen - Sakura pigma (micron 05 - Black)

Brushpen (Tombow)

Art board (300 gsm)

Step 1

The first step in drawing mandala is to draw the grid. The Mandala grid acts as template.

To draw a mandala grid, you need to find the core point by dividing all four sides into the equal section. Then connecting the opposite points by creating an intersecting line. The intersecting point will be our core point.

Step 2

The next step is to take your procircle and mark points after every 45 degrees. The calculation will be 360/8=45. Now connect the opposite points using the core point as the center.

Step 3

Take your compass and draw a series of circles by placing the compass on the core point. This will create a radial grid.

Step 4

As I mentioned earlier, I'm gonna use only two shapes to draw this complete Mandala.

First is a small petal, and the second is leaf petal. These are some of the basic shapes in Mandala drawing.

#Tip - Whenever drawing these leaf petals, always draw one side stroke first throughout the layer and then repeat the same for the other side.

#Tip - Always draw a double stroke to all your Mandala shapes. Even if you want to color or fill them using designs and patterns, its always better to have a double stroke so that one shape doesn't get mixed with others.

Step 5

The fifth and final step is coloring/filling. You can color the complete shape or use patterns to fill them. Here, I'm gonna do both.

I prefer to do hatching first and then move into shading or coloring. It's easy and saves a lot of time.

#Tip when you color the shape or area, make sure you first outline them and then go ahead with coloring so that you don't make a mess by going beyond the shape.

That's it!

Mandala drawing is always therapeutic. So make sure you be patient while drawing and enjoy whatever you draw. Though it's a time taking process, it's worth all the time spent.

Unlike, how I did now, you can experiment by filling the grids with spirals, patterns, swirls, dots, and so on. But make sure you start something simple and then later you can get into complex designs.

The mandala that looks complicated is often constructed using very simple and basic shapes. Therefore go ahead and keep trying. And share it with me as well :)

If you like to see this tutorial as video, you can check this How to draw a basic Mandala video. you'll like it.