Circus colouring page

A big top tent with a six-panel roof, curtains tied back, bunting, a striped ball and a podium.

A big top tent stands facing the viewer in the middle of the page. Its conical roof is divided by seam lines into six broad panels and carries two triangular flags on short poles at the peak. Under the roof edge runs a valance of five rounded scallops. The entrance stands open with a curtain on each side, gathered and tied back with a band, and a low threshold across the bottom. In front of the tent a large ball with curved stripes sits to the left and a round podium stands to the right. Bunting made of five triangles runs out to each side from under the roof.

The six roof panels are the largest shapes on the sheet and they are what makes the tent a tent. Alternating two colours round the cone is the classic reading and it takes six strokes. Because there are six panels — an even number — the alternation closes cleanly all the way round, which is worth knowing before you start: with an odd number two neighbours would end up sharing a colour.

The five scallops of the valance run under the roof edge and they are the second repeated shape. Giving them the same alternation as the panels above them but offset by one makes the two rows lock together; giving them a single colour makes them a band. With five of them, an alternation cannot close, so a single colour or a three-colour rotation is the tidier choice down there.

The two curtains are the tallest closed shapes on the sheet and they are drawn with fold lines running down them. Those folds are the place to vary pressure rather than colour: lighter down the middle of each fold and darker in the creases makes the fabric hang. The tie-back bands are small and are the natural place for a colour that appears nowhere else.

The striped ball is the busiest small object: a circle divided by curved lines into bands that narrow towards the edges, which is what makes a flat circle read as a sphere. Alternating two colours round it works exactly as it does on the roof, and matching the ball's colours to the roof's ties the front of the drawing to the back of it. The podium beside it is a plain drum with a rim and is the quietest shape on the page.

The bunting is ten small triangles, five on each side, hanging from two lines that run out towards the edges of the sheet. They are the fastest thing here to colour and the most effective: a rotation of three colours along each string, rather than an alternation of two, keeps the two sides from looking identical and takes the same amount of time.

One plain point sits in the shape of the roof. A big top's canvas is cut in panels that run from the peak down to the edge, and the seams between them are where the load is carried — which is why the drawing shows the roof divided by lines radiating from the top rather than by rings around it. The scalloped valance hanging below the edge is a separate strip of canvas, and that is why it is drawn as its own row of shapes rather than as part of the roof.

Print at actual size on plain A4 paper. The bunting triangles and the tie-back bands are what a smaller print loses. If markers are the plan, thicker card is worth the swap, because six roof panels and two curtains cover most of the sheet in solid colour. Cut out along the tent's outline and it comes away with a flat bottom edge that stands on a shelf; the ball and the podium cut free separately.

Published 29 August 2026Updated 29 August 2026629 words