The Michael Harding Brecon Beacons collection adds 10 new colours to the Michael Harding oil paint range. It’s the final of four collections and sets released in celebration of the 40th anniversary of the company – joining the Brick Lane, Whitechapel, and Tunbridge Wells collections. The Brecon Beacons title refers to the current site in South Wales, where Michael Harding has operated since 2010. The collection includes a variety of transparent and semi-transparent colours, perfect for building up vibrant glazes and casting chromatic shadows. Ahead of the release, Michael Harding visited the Jackson’s Studio to reveal and swatch each of the new paints, and give his insights on each colour.
The Michael Harding Brecon Beacons Collection will be available from Tuesday 4th August 2026.
Contents
0:00 Introduction
0:28 Bismuth Vanadate
1:03 Hansa Yellow Medium
1:37 Amber
2:04 Pyrrole Crimson
2:31 Perrindo Maroon
2:53 Corinthian Purple
3:26 Imperial Purple
4:04 Cobalt Blue Deep
4:39 Cosmic Blue
5:21 Forest Green
5:46 Conclusion
6:14 Credits
Film Extract
Hi everybody, I’m here today to talk about the various colours that I’ve been launching. This set is called the Brecon Beacons Set. It’s the most up-to-date in the chronological sequence. The Brecon Beacons, now, of course, is the place where we reside, with our colour mill. We’ve put together this lovely set, and I’d love to show you the colours.
Bismuth Vanadate
The first colour I’d like to show you is Bismuth Vanadate (PY184), which comes from a family of very lightfast pigments. This is a bright yellow; quite a green shade of yellow is the best way to describe it. It is really rich and could be described as a semi-opaque, semi-transparent yellow.
Hansa Yellow Medium
The next colour I’d love to show you is Hansa Yellow Medium (PY97). As you can see, it’s another really rich, vibrant yellow, almost a sort of sunflower colour. It’s transparent, and it almost has a sort of gingery quality to it, quite red as a yellow. It’s going to be stunning for creating oranges and other obvious mixes.
Amber
The next colour I want to show you today is a colour we’ve named Amber (PY74, PR170, PY3). It has no relationship to the resin, but we just tried to think of a colour name that would sort of enhance the appearance of this really interesting orange. It’s a gorgeous sort of reddish, ambery colour. But it just makes this wonderful, sort of furious fire colour. You can see that it has great covering power.
Pyrrole Crimson
The next colour I’d love to show you is Pyrrole Crimson (PR264), which comes from a family of very, very lightfast reds. One that I’ve wanted to have in the range for a long time and finally got round to it. It’s just a gorgeous, nice, deep red. You can see how versatile this is going to be – it’s a beautiful, rich, scarlet crimson.
Perrindo Maroon
The next colour we have here is Perrindo Maroon (PR179), a single pigment. It has beautiful clarity and a deep richness down to the realms of Alizarins and Crimsons – almost deep madder. It has many, many uses.
Corinthian Purple
Corinthian Purple (PR112, PB29, PV23) is a colour in our watercolour range and just had to be added to the oils. As you can probably guess, I’ve had a lot of fun developing these colours. They have no bounds. Corinthian Purple is so dark and smoky.
Imperial Purple
And now we have Imperial Purple (PB29, PV19). And it’s a really convenient colour; I’m thinking of all the colours I could put with it now too. Let’s just do something crazy. I’m going to do a combination with Hansa Yellow Medium, and I just want to see where it goes. It just does things; you get gingery browns in there. I mean, look at that. It’s just gorgeous
Cobalt Blue Deep
Now we have another edition of a Cobalt Blue Deep (PB74). It’s a wonderful shade of blue, and it almost needs no introduction, as a cobalt, of course. Glorious, glorious colour. Perfect for skies, clothing, the choice is yours. Wonderfully lightfast. And interestingly, if you ever burn this piece of paper that I’ve painted on, and so that the paint gets destroyed, you’re left with the blue powder of the pigment because it’s a pigment that can withstand very high temperatures, very high heat. It’s a beautiful blue.
Cosmic Blue
The next colour I’d like to show you all is Cosmic Blue (PBk11, PB15.1). Now, a lot of you probably would wonder about the name, and I’ll be absolutely honest with you: there’s no big historical connection; we just had to come up with a name that people could associate the colour with. You can see a blueness under there, and it’s got a mistiness. The texture is great. It produces almost a smoky grey.
Forest Green
The next colour I would love to show you is Forest Green (PBr7, PB15.1). And again, we put it into the range really to help the landscape painters. I just felt there were some gaps, and it would be rather interesting to have some deep greens. If you add a bit of yellow, just to bring it out a bit so you can see what’s going on with it. There’s something quite hazy going on in there, and you could see how it would make quite an interesting grey.
Conclusion
Well, everybody, I’ve been delighted to share the colours from my Brecon Beacons set with you today. I’d love you all to give them a try. For me, they evoke a very special time in my life, having been able to move to Wales, a place I never thought I’d love, and it’s a very beautiful part of the world. So I’m very pleased to recommend this Brecon Beacons set to you. Thank you.
The Michael Harding Brecon Beacons Collection will be available from Tuesday 4th August 2026.
Further Reading
Michael Harding Introduces the Whitechapel Oil Colours
Michael Harding Introduces the Brick Lane Oil Colours
Michael Harding Introduces His 10 New Oil Colours
Review of Michael Harding Brick Lane Oil Colours
Shop Michael Harding Oil Colours on jacksonsart.com
