Draw a Cactus in a Plant Pot Step by Step

by easydrawingtips

This guide shows how to draw a cactus in a clay flowerpot. The example is of a fairly small cactus plant similar to what you might have inside your home.

The guide focuses on line drawing, color, and shading. The goal is to create a slightly stylized and simplified drawing of a cactus that is well-structured, colorful, and easily recognizable. Don’t worry if it seems like there are a lot of stages to the tutorial. Such a detailed breakdown is provided to make it easy to follow along.

If drawing on paper, be sure to start the tutorial in pencil. Make light lines, as some of the steps will require you to do some erasing. You can trace over your drawing with darker lines after adding the last part of the cactus (the spikes).

Supplies Needed for This Potted Cactus Drawing

Regular HB Graphite Pencil: For the initial line drawing.
White Paper: Drawing paper or standard printer paper.
Eraser: Just about any eraser should be good enough as the linework for this drawing is not very complicated.
Black Marker (recommended): For getting black outlines like those shown in the examples.
Colored Pencils (recommended): A good and easy coloring option that allows for blending smooth gradients. However, you can use other options if you prefer.

Step 1 – Outline the Shape of the Cactus

For this very easy step, outline the main shape of the cactus (its silhouette). Make it fairly round and leave the bottom of its outline open.

Step 2 – Draw the Plant Pot

Unlike the cactus, drawing the pot’s shape is a little bit more complicated. However, if you follow the instructions below it should not be too difficult.

Set the Pot’s Height

First, draw a pair of straight horizontal lines to set the pot’s width and height.

Draw the Top & Bottom

Once the height is set, outline the pot’s top and base. This part is slightly tricky due to perspective and eye level.

As the pot is being viewed on an angle, draw its otherwise round top and base as ovals. Outline the bottom as though it’s transparent (so that it’s fully visible).

To accommodate for “eye level,” make the bottom oval rounder than the top. In addition to this, show perspective by drawing the upper parts of both ovals flatter than the lower parts.

The explanation for this is as follows:

Due to the bottom being lower down in relation to the viewer’s eyes (if a person was looking at this pot), the bottom appears rounder.

Because of perspective, the upper parts of the ovals that are further out in the distance appear “smaller” and therefore flatter.

For more on eye level and perspective see:

Perspective Drawing Tutorial for Beginners

Plant pot top and bottom drawing cleaned up

After you have the top and bottom of the pot outlined, erase the horizontal line used to help draw the top oval and the part of the pot hidden behind the plant.

Draw the Rim

Draw the rim at the top of the pot. Outline its bottom using the outline of the upper oval as a guide. Make the rim’s bottom just a little rounder than the top (as it’s lower down). Afterwards, define its sides with a pair of straight lines.

Draw the Walls

Draw the pot’s walls by projecting straight lines from the bottom of the rim down to the sides of the bottom oval. Shift these lines slightly inward from the outer edges of the rim to create a small overhang.

After adding the walls, erase the upper part of the bottom oval as well as the remaining guide lines.

Draw the Inner Edge

To finish the pot’s outline, draw the inner edge of the rim (around the opening). This will show the thickness of the pot’s walls. Without it, the pot would appear paper thin.

The inner edge should have the same shape as the oval used to define the pot’s top (but smaller). You may need to erase a little bit of the plants outline when adding it.

Draw the Soil

Finally, draw the soil. In this case the pot is filled just a little bit past the rim make it barely visible (around each side of the bottom of the plant). The soil’s shape should somewhat follow that of the pot’s opening.

Step – 3 Draw the Ribs Along the Cactus

After you have the pot outlined, return to drawing the cactus. Start by adding a series of ribs running along its surface (top to bottom). To keep things simpler, draw the center most rib as though it’s facing directly at the viewer. Draw the ribs on its sides with each consecutive rib facing more sideways. Show this by making the lines that define them more rounded the closer they are to the main outline. Also, decrease the distance between them the closer they get to the edges.

Add the edges of the ribs, starting with the one in the middle. Draw it running roughly through the rib’s center. Add the edges of the two ribs next to it much closer to their outer sides. Because the remaining ribs are facing more sideways than the three in the front, their edges are already defined by their main outlines and there is no need to add anything else for this stage of the drawing.

The edges will help give the cactus a more three-dimensional appearance. You can also leave some breaks in the lines that define them to make the edges appear a little softer.

Step – 4 Draw Clusters of Cactus Spikes Along the Ribs

For the last (but very definitive) set of details, add the cactus spikes. Draw these in batches along the edges of the ribs. Cactus spikes are usually fairly evenly spaced, so you can make the distance between each batch similar in length.

Once you’ve added all the spikes, you can trace over your drawing with darker pencil lines or a thin black marker (if you feel confident in your tracing ability).

Interesting fact about cactus spikes: they are actually leaves!

For drawing more traditional-looking leaves, see:

Step – 5 Color the Cactus Green & The Pot an Orange Brown

Green and orange are colors that go well together. Cactuses are naturally green, and clay pots tend to be an orange-brown. This makes for an easy choice of colors. To start, fill in the cactus with a solid green. Next, make the pot an orange-brown, but use a lighter variant of this color for the upper surface of the rim (to show that it’s facing towards the light). Finally, make the soil inside the pot a dark grey.

Step – 6 Shade the Cactus Drawing

In this example, the shading is simplified. However, it’s enough to give the drawing a more three-dimensional appearance.

The shadows are placed as though the light is coming from the upper left of the cactus.

Shade the drawing, starting with light to dark gradients. Make the cactus gradually darker on the side facing away from the light as well as along the bottom.

Add another gradient running from one side of the pot to the other so that similar to the cactus, it is lighter on the side facing the light and gradually gets darker towards the side facing away from it.

Finally, add a shadow cast opposite the light source that gradually gets lighter as it moves away from the pot.

After adding the gradients, add the “hard” shadows. Fully darken the cactus ribs facing away from the light and add a thin shadow below the pot’s rim. Finally, also darken the pot’s inner walls.

Once done with the above, you should have a finished drawing of a cactus plant in a pot.

Conclusion – a Simplified Art Style Can Look Great

This guide shows how to draw a cactus plant in a pot in a slightly stylized but still a fairly realistic manner. Although simplified, the example looks nice because it follows the rules of perspective and makes effective use of color and shading.

By showing the most important characteristics of your subject and by properly structuring your artwork, you help ensure that it both looks good and is easily recognizable.

For more drawing tutorials done in a similar style, see: