Caroline
Because of a woman’s impeccable beauty, she has long been a common subject of many artworks, and drawing is no exception.
Learning how to draw a woman will open the doors to much more complex drawings in the future. However, because of a woman’s intricate features, it may seem very challenging to draw a woman.
Fortunately, we have curated a step-by-step process on how to draw a woman, summed up in 9 easy and quick steps.
Each instruction comes with an illustration to serve as your visual guide as you follow the steps one by one, making the process a lot easier.
With this guide, you might be surprised to discover that drawing a woman is actually not as difficult as you think!
Have fun and remember—the sky’s the limit to your imagination!
How to Draw a Woman – Let’s get started!
Step 1
Start by drawing an upright oval shape on the upper middle portion of your paper. This outlines the head or the face of the woman.
To ensure that the woman will be drawn in the center, you can create reference lines by drawing an intersecting vertical and horizontal line across the paper.
Use this as a guideline to help keep your drawing aligned and proportion. The vertical line above the horizontal line marks the spot where you should draw the oval shape.
Step 2 – Outline the Woman’s Head and Shoulders
Draw a short curved line right underneath the woman’s head on the left side. Then, extend the line by drawing a slightly slanted horizontal line going further to the left.
Afterwards, bring the line downwards for about half an inch.
Repeat the same step to create a line with a similar form on the opposite side. At this point, the neck and the chest of the woman should be fully formed.
Step 3 – Create the Dress the Woman is Wearing
Right underneath the left side of the chest, draw an inward curved vertical line forming the waist.
Then, extend the line outwards to structure the skirt of the woman’s dress.
Step 4 – Afterwards, Draw the Woman’s Left Leg
Draw an elongated shape with a rounded bottom underneath the hem of the dress.
This forms the woman’s left leg. Don’t forget to add a curved line on the feet to create the shoe!
Step 5 – Now, Complete Both Legs of the Woman
Repeat the previous step on the opposite side. Make sure that both legs have a similar length and form.
After finishing this step, the woman’s both legs, feet, and shoes should be complete.
Step 6 – Draw the Woman’s Left and Right Arm
Draw a sleeve on both sides of the upper body. Then, draw an arm with a hand underneath each sleeve. This creates both the arms and hands of the woman.
Don’t forget to add a curved line below the woman’s neck. This forms the collar hem of the dress that the woman is wearing.
Step 7 – Afterwards, Draw the Hair of the Woman
Continue by defining the hairline of the woman. Afterwards, draw the top of her head and the hair surrounding her face.
As you can see in the illustration, we’ve drawn a simple short bob hairstyle. However, feel free to draw any kind of hair you like, whether it’s a short pixie cut or a long curly hair.
You can even put the hair on a ponytail, a braid, or any hairstyle you prefer. It’s all up to you! After all, it’s your work of art.
Step 8 – Add Streaks of Hair to Create Texture
At the top of the woman’s head, draw a few curved lines to add texture on the hair, making it appear more realistic.
Keep in mind to draw the streaks of hair with light strokes. Don’t press down too hard with your pencil to avoid creating unrealistic harsh lines.
Step 9 – Complete the Woman’s Facial Features
Now, it’s time to add the features inside the woman’s face.
Starting from top to bottom, proceed by drawing two horizontal pointed shapes below the forehead to create the eyebrows.
Afterwards, draw a wide oval shape underneath each eyebrow to create the eyes.
Within the eyes, draw a small circle shape with a smaller circle inside to create the pupil and the iris respectively. Shade the entire pupil while leaving out the iris unshaded.
Moving on to the nose and the lips, draw a line forming a semicircle to create the nose. Then, draw a wide upward curved line to put a wide smile on the woman’s face.
Don’t forget to add sideways oval shape on both cheeks to create a dramatic “blushing effect”—so charming!
There you have it—we’ve successfully drawn a beautiful woman. Now, it’s finally time for the part we’ve all been waiting for, which is coloring the woman!
This is the part where you can showcase your artistic skills, especially your ability to mix and match colors.
The colors you will be using on your drawing is entirely up to you! But here’s a useful tip: combine the colors white, yellow, blue, and red to create a customized skin tone color.
You may need to add more of a specific color depending on the complexion you’re aiming for.
Take note that skin tone colors are best achieved when using blendable coloring materials like watercolor or acrylic paint.
Have fun playing with colors and watch as the woman ultimately comes to life!
3 More tips to make your woman drawing easy!
Find out how you can make this woman drawing easy to do!
If there are ever parts of a drawing you’re struggling with, there are ways to get around it without making the drawing worse. In fact, sometimes these tricks can even make the drawing better!
For this drawing, let’s say you’re struggling to draw the eyes. You could get around this by adding some sunglasses over her eyes.
Not only will that help with the part that you struggled with, but it will also make this woman drawing even more stylish!
There are many little tricks such as this that you can use to make the drawing experience easier and even more fun.
One of the best ways to make this an easy to draw woman is by using some basic shapes to help with the proportions. For this tip, you will want to use a pencil to draw the shapes, and the lighter the better.
For example, you could use an oval shape for her head and then a series of rectangular shapes for her body and limbs. If you were to do this, you should try to use the shapes in conjunction with the steps of our guide.
Using these shapes can make it so much easier to create this woman sketch!
Lastly, you may want to use a realistic reference to help you out as you draw. If you have a friend or a family member who would be willing to pose for you, you can use them to help you as you draw.
If you don’t have someone to pose for you, you can find reference pictures online that you can use. Craft stores will also often sell wooden posable figures that artists use to help them when drawing people.
These are a few of the resources that you could use to make this so much easier to do, and it will help you to get the proportions looking more accurate.
What are some other tools and reference materials you could use to make this drawing of a woman even easier?
Your Woman Drawing is Complete!
We hope you enjoy this step-by-step woman drawing tutorial. Whether you’re a beginner or an expert in drawing, we’re certain that you were able to follow the steps effortlessly. It was a lot of fun, wasn’t it?
Remember, all of our drawing tutorials are completely free for you to use as learning materials to help you further hone your drawing skills.
Go ahead and visit our “How to Draw” catalog to check out many more drawing tutorials like this. What would you like to draw next?
Once you’ve finished drawing and coloring a woman, don’t forget to show off your work of art. Take a photo of your masterpiece and share it on our Facebook page and Pinterest.
Don’t be shy, you’ve worked hard for it so it surely looks awesome!
We would love to see your beautiful woman drawing!
