• 60 ideas

Circle Art Ideas to Draw, Paint or Build With a Compass

Three ideas that start from a circle per press, with the width of circle to trace and the minutes to allow.

Circle Art Ideas to Draw, Paint or Build With a Compass

Show all 60
  1. Eye close-up: iris, pupil, one highlight8 cm circle, 20 minutes. Pupil solid black, iris lines run like spokes, and the window highlight overlaps both.
  2. Stained-glass circle with black leading15 cm circle, 35 minutes. Draw the thick black lines first. Fill each pane flat. No two neighbours share a colour.
  3. Your name repeated round six wedges15 cm circle, 30 minutes. Letter it in one wedge, tall strokes touching both edges, then trace it into the other five.

Next step More planets and moons to drawMore optical patterns

All 60 ideas

Scenes inside a circle 18

  • Bird's nest with three eggs from above 10 cm circle, 20 minutes. Twigs are short overlapping strokes that follow the rim, packed darker toward the eggs.
  • City skyline wrapped round a tiny planet 10 cm circle, 25 minutes. Buildings stand on the outside of the rim, pointing away from the centre. Turn the page.
  • Day and night sharing one circle 12 cm circle, 20 minutes. Split it with an S curve, not a straight line. Sun side stays pale, moon side is filled dark.
  • Fishbowl with one goldfish and a castle 12 cm circle, 10 minutes. Flatten the top for the opening. The water surface is a thin ellipse, never a straight line.
  • Forest canopy seen from the forest floor 12 cm circle, 20 minutes. Trunks lean in from the rim toward one point in the middle. Leave a ragged patch of sky there.
  • Four seasons of one tree in a quartered circle 15 cm circle, 30 minutes. Trunk on the centre line. Each quarter gets its own crown: blossom, full leaf, orange, bare.
  • Full moon with a bare branch across it 10 cm circle, 10 minutes. Leave the moon as clean paper. The branch is solid black and crosses well off centre.
  • Hot-air balloon seen from underneath 12 cm circle, 20 minutes. Stripes are wedges that meet in the middle, where the basket is one small square.
  • Koi pond seen from directly above 15 cm circle, 25 minutes. Two fish chase each other round the centre. A lily pad is a small circle with one V cut out.
  • Looking up from the bottom of a well 10 cm circle, 15 minutes. The circle is the sky. Bricks shrink as they climb toward it, and a bucket hangs dead centre.
  • Magnifying glass over a trail of ants 8 cm circle, 15 minutes. Ants inside the lens are twice the size of the ants outside it. Add a handle at four o'clock.
  • Mountain lake at sunset inside a circle 12 cm circle, 20 minutes. Horizon a third of the way up. Let two pine tips break the rim so the frame reads as a window.
  • Porthole view of a passing whale 10 cm circle, 15 minutes. Double the rim, add eight rivets. Waterline across the middle, the whale one low curve below.
  • Round landscape painted on a paper plate 20 cm circle, 45 minutes. A round painting is a tondo. Curve the horizon very slightly so the scene sits in the circle.
  • Snow globe village under falling flakes 12 cm circle, 25 minutes. Sit the circle on a flat base. Three roofs, one spire, and flakes that swirl, never fall.
  • Sunset gradient circle with a black tree line 12 cm circle, 25 minutes. Yellow low, orange, then violet at the top. Once dry, a black tree line crosses the bottom.
  • Telescope view of a ship on the horizon 8 cm circle, 10 minutes. Fill outside the circle solid black. Tiny ship, big sky: the emptiness sells the distance.
  • Treasure island that fills one circle 15 cm circle, 30 minutes. The rim is the sea. Wobbly coast inside, triangle mountains, a dashed path, a cross to finish.

Things that are round 19

  • Analogue clock showing ten past ten 12 cm circle, 10 minutes. Mark 12, 3, 6 and 9 first, then two ticks between each pair. At ten past ten the hands smile.
  • Button jar: twenty buttons, no two alike 2 cm circles, 15 minutes. Trace a coin. Two holes or four, a raised rim, a shank, a chipped edge. Overlap them.
  • Citrus slice with a thick rind 8 cm circle, 10 minutes. A second ring for the pith, then wedges as rounded triangles that stop short of the centre.
  • Compass rose with eight named winds 12 cm circle, 25 minutes. Long points for N, E, S, W and short ones for NE, SE, SW, NW. A fleur-de-lis marks north.
  • Cup of coffee from above, leaf in the foam 8 cm circle, 10 minutes. Two rings close together make the cup wall. The leaf is a stack of chevrons on one stem.
  • Curled hedgehog with only its snout showing 8 cm circle, 10 minutes. Spines are short flicks that all lean away from the nose. Only the snout and two feet poke out.
  • Doughnut with icing drips and sprinkles 8 cm circle, 10 minutes. Put the hole a little above centre and the ring looks thick. Icing has a wavy edge, five drips.
  • Eight phases of the Moon round a ring 3 cm circles, 20 minutes. New, crescent, quarter, gibbous, full and back. In the north, waxing is lit on the right.
  • Eye close-up: iris, pupil, one highlight 8 cm circle, 20 minutes. Pupil solid black, iris lines run like spokes, and the window highlight overlaps both.
  • Ferris wheel with a cabin on every spoke 15 cm circle, 30 minutes. Twelve spokes like a clock face. Every cabin hangs straight down, whatever its spoke does.
  • Gas giant with cloud bands and one storm 12 cm circle, 15 minutes. Bands dip a little at both ends so the circle reads as a ball. The storm is one oval.
  • Orange built from dots of pure colour 10 cm circle, 30 minutes. Yellow, orange and red dots side by side, blue in the shadow. The eye mixes them: pointillism.
  • Snail shell spiral that fills the circle 8 cm circle, 5 minutes. Start at the rim and wind inward, keeping the gap between coils shrinking evenly. Stop at a dot.
  • Soap bubbles with rainbow rims 5 cm circles, 20 minutes. Colour only the rim and leave the middle as paper. One curved highlight each, all on one side.
  • Sphere lit from the top left 10 cm circle, 20 minutes. Highlight top left, darkest band just inside the bottom right edge, a paler rim below that.
  • Sunflower head of crossing seed spirals 12 cm circle, 30 minutes. Seeds sit on two sets of spirals curving opposite ways, typically 34 one way and 55 the other.
  • Tree stump with wide and narrow rings 12 cm circle, 20 minutes. One ring a year. A wide ring was a wet year with a long growing season, a thin one a drought.
  • Vinyl record with a hand-lettered label 12 cm circle, 10 minutes. Grooves are rings you never finish: break each one where the light crosses the record.
  • Watercolour planets dropped into wet circles 8 cm circles, 15 minutes. Wet the circle with clean water first. Dropped-in colour spreads softly and stops at the edge.

Compass patterns and radial designs 15

  • Big circle packed with touching circles 15 cm circle, 30 minutes. Each new circle touches three others. Carried on for ever, the figure is an Apollonian gasket.
  • Chain of rings woven over and under 5 cm circles, 15 minutes. Draw every ring double. At each crossing rub out one pair of lines in turn: over, under, over.
  • Compass snowflake on six radius steps 10 cm circle, 20 minutes. Step the compass round the rim at the circle's own radius. It lands six times: one arm each.
  • Overlapping circles grid across the page 4 cm circles, 30 minutes. Every new circle is centred where two others cross. Shade every other lens and flowers appear.
  • Radial design made only of leaves and petals 15 cm circle, 45 minutes. Ring one is tiny petals, ring two pointed leaves in the gaps, ring three bigger again.
  • Radial design with eight matching wedges 15 cm circle, 40 minutes. Rule four lines through the centre. What goes in one wedge goes in all eight, ring by ring.
  • Rose window with twelve stone spokes 15 cm circle, 40 minutes. Spokes run from a small central ring to the rim. Each pane between ends in a pointed arch.
  • Six-petal rosette from seven circles 5 cm circles, 15 minutes. Never change the compass. Six circles centred on the rim of the first all cross at its centre.
  • Six-point star stepped round the rim 10 cm circle, 10 minutes. Step the radius round the rim for six marks. Join every second mark, then the other three.
  • Stained-glass circle with black leading 15 cm circle, 35 minutes. Draw the thick black lines first. Fill each pane flat. No two neighbours share a colour.
  • Two ring sets crossing each other 10 cm circles, 25 minutes. Two targets of fine rings, centres 3 cm apart. New curved bands appear where the rings cross.
  • Two-circle lens turned into a leaf or a fish 6 cm circles, 10 minutes. Each circle passes through the other's centre. The almond between them is a vesica piscis.
  • Wobbling rings that seem to move 12 cm circle, 25 minutes. Twenty rings from one centre. Fill every second ring black and pinch the spacing on one side.
  • Year wheel with one drawing per month 18 cm circle, 45 minutes. Twelve wedges, as on a clock face. January sits at the top. One small drawing per wedge.
  • Your name repeated round six wedges 15 cm circle, 30 minutes. Letter it in one wedge, tall strokes touching both edges, then trace it into the other five.

Paint and colour studies 8

  • Full moon on black paper in white and grey 10 cm circle, 15 minutes. Dab white with a sponge and leave gaps. The black paper showing through becomes the grey seas.
  • Galaxy in a circle: sponge, spatter, stars 12 cm circle, 30 minutes. Mask outside the circle. Sponge dark blues and violet, then flick white off an old toothbrush.
  • One colour in five steps, ring by ring 12 cm circle, 20 minutes. Darkest in the centre. Add white or water for each ring outward. Five steps must read as five.
  • One dot grown ring by ring to the page edge 20 cm circle, 30 minutes. A classroom favourite in mid-September. Each ring changes pattern: dashes, zigzags, scales.
  • Rings stamped with a cardboard tube 5 cm circles, 10 minutes. Dip the end of the tube in paint and stamp overlapping rings. Turn three into faces or wheels.
  • Squares that each hold nested rings of colour 6 cm circles, 40 minutes. Freehand, no compass. In every square, pair two colours from opposite sides of the wheel.
  • Three overlapping circles in red, yellow, blue 8 cm circles, 10 minutes. In transparent paint the overlaps mix orange, green and violet, and the middle goes brown.
  • Twelve-hue colour wheel from three primaries 15 cm circle, 40 minutes. Red, yellow and blue a third apart. Mix three secondaries between them, then six tertiaries.

How it works

Trace a mug, a tape roll or a coin and start: each of these 60 circle art ideas grows from one traced or compass-drawn circle. Every idea gives the circle's width and the minutes to allow. Five groups sort them: scenes inside a circle, things that are round, compass patterns, paint and colour studies, and Quick for ten minutes or less.

Read the full guide

Why a round frame helps

A round frame has no corners to fill, so the eye goes straight to the middle. The best things to draw in a circle lean on that: a telescope view holding one tiny ship, a full moon crossed by a single black branch. Let two pine tips break the rim and the border turns into a window. A round picture is called a tondo.

Circle drawing ideas that need a compass

The compass patterns rest on one fact: a circle's radius steps round its own rim six times. That gives the six-petal rosette, the snowflake and the six-point star with no measuring. Lock the compass, centre each new circle where two others cross, and a grid grows across the page. Mandala, Sanskrit for circle, names a spiritual symbol in Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism, so the radial designs here are plain patterns, not sacred ones.

  • Nothing round to trace? Draw the circle from the shoulder, fast and light, three times round, then ink the best pass.
  • Trace in light pencil and ink the rim last. A wobbly rim is the first thing anyone notices.
  • Rule the wedges of a radial design with a protractor: eight wedges are 45 degrees each, twelve are 30.

Questions and answers

What can I trace if I do not have a compass?

Anything round from the kitchen or the desk. A CD is 12 cm across, and tape rolls, mugs, bowls and side plates cover most other sizes here. For the 2 to 5 cm circles use a coin or a bottle cap. Keep the pencil upright, or the circle comes out lopsided.

Which of these are written for paint?

The Paint and colour studies group holds 18 circle painting ideas written for a brush: a twelve-hue colour wheel mixed from three primaries, watercolour planets dropped into wet circles, a galaxy flicked off an old toothbrush. For work built from dots alone, see dot painting ideas.

What is a good circle project for a whole class?

One dot grown ring by ring. Each child adds rings of colour or pattern round a single dot until the page runs out, and many schools do it for a dot day in mid-September. The squares holding nested rings work too: each child paints one square, and the squares join into a wall display.

More tools

Show 6 more

Browse Drawing Ideas