How to Draw a Whippet

Whippet drawing is fun and easy. Find out how to draw a whippet like a pro.

Unleash Your Creativity: Draw and Paint Whippets!

There’s something truly magical about putting pencil or paintbrush to paper and capturing the grace of a whippet. With their sleek lines, expressive eyes, and poised elegance, whippets are a dream subject for artists—whether you’re just starting your creative journey or have years of sketchbooks under your belt.

Whippets aren’t just beautiful animals—they’re living inspiration. Their athletic bodies, gentle curves, and soulful faces provide endless material for drawing and painting. And best of all? You don’t need to be a professional artist to begin. All you need is a love for art and a fascination with these incredible dogs.

Why Whippets Make Amazing Art Subjects

There’s a reason so many artists fall in love with painting and sketching dogs, and whippets hold a special place in that world. Their distinctive shape sets them apart: a streamlined silhouette with long legs, a tucked waist, and those iconic, expressive eyes that seem to speak volumes. Whippets combine strength with elegance, movement with stillness, and softness with speed.

Because they’re so visually striking, they make excellent practice for learning anatomy, form, and motion. Whether you're capturing a whippet mid-sprint or curled up in a sunbeam, you're sure to learn something new every time you put pencil to paper.

Whippets are ideal models. When they lay on our favorite couches, they are the perfect victims for artistic adventures. And if the portrait is not flattering enough, they don’t complain!

How to Draw a Whippet: Getting Started

When you're learning how to draw a whippet, start simple. Begin by observing their form. Use reference photos or better yet, sketch from life if you have a whippet nearby. Notice the lines of their spine, the delicacy of their legs, and the proportions of their head.

Try breaking the body down into basic shapes—circles, ovals, and lines. This helps you understand how everything connects before diving into details. Whippets have a particular elegance in their posture, even when resting, so take your time capturing that gentle S-curve of their body.

Don’t worry about getting it “perfect.” Art isn’t about precision—it’s about expression. The more you practice, the more confident you’ll become, and the more your drawings will capture the spirit of these wonderful dogs.

Tools and Techniques: From Sketching to Painting

Drawing whippets is a fantastic way to create dog art and learn about dog anatomy.

In fact our small hounds sport a very essential outline, the kind of stylized silhouette most dogs hide under their fur.

Probably no drawing school would ever approve of this easy method and it could be considered a shortcut but it is easy and fun and will give you immediate results.

This technique could be used also to get familiar with the whippet shape before it gets permanently engraved in your neurons and you become so proficient in how to draw dogs that you can do it directly from memory.

Follow these simple steps and in no time your walls will fill with whippet drawing masterpieces.

How to Draw a Whippet Step by Step

First Step

Choose a whippet photo. For your first experiments, look for a picture with a simple outline, something that doesn't get too tangled up or confusing.

Step Two

Print your photo on paper. In the example below I used white paper to make the process more obvious but actually textured or colored paper give a more accomplished  final result.

Step Three

Reverse the printed sheet of paper, tape it on a window and trace the outline of the dog with a pencil. At this point you'll have the dog's shape reversed on paper.

Step Four

Keeping the original image in front of you for inspiration color the inside of the shape. You can use various techniques: on colored paper, pastels can look quite dramatic or if you used light paper like in the example, watercolor pencils are the easiest option.

Step Five

If you used watercolor pencils, with a wet brush work the color on the dog's drawing.

Step Six

Highlight the picture. This is the fun part: use the darkest black for the eyes and nose and when it is dry, enhance the lightest parts of the body and give the eyes and nose a small touch of white as sparkle.

Et voilà you created your own whippet drawing masterpiece!

Join the Whippet Art Movement!

So, whether you're just learning how to draw a whippet or you’ve been painting dogs for years, we invite you to join the movement. Take that idea, that flicker of inspiration, and make something beautiful. Share your work, connect with others, and celebrate these incredible animals through your art.

Your style, your perspective, your creativity—it all matters. And the world could always use more whippets in it, especially when they’re created with heart and soul.

 If the art bug bit you, don't be shy, let the world know. Reach out, we’d love to see what you create!

With the form below send us your whippet paintings or drawings, they'll have a special place in our homepage!