I have 2 labradors – a white labrador and a chocolate labrador.
I’ve featured them in several of my illustrations and in my eBooks and I honestly enjoy drawing both of them whenever I can.
Drawing animals requires you to study animal tutorials but not if we’re drawing dogs in a kawaii style!
In this post, I’m going to break down how to a kawaii dog in a step-by-step way so that you can learn how to draw a cute dog easily!
In this tutorial, I’m going to show you how to draw a kawaii labrador dog!
You can check out my other kawaii tutorials here.
Whether you’re a kid or an adult beginner, these steps are extremely easy to follow, let’s get started!
I’ll even show you how to color it so you can get different results!
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I am currently using an iPad Pro and an Apple Pencil to create all my illustrations. But you can use any tool – a pen and paper or Copic markers or Photoshop because the drawing method remains the same.
Table of Contents
How to draw a kawaii dog – Step by step instructions
Step 1: Drawing the head of the kawaii labrador
I always start with the easiest step first – drawing the head.
Just start with a nice big semi-circle. This will be the dog’s forehead.
I’m drawing the dog in a cartoon style. You can draw any shape you feel comfortable with but I highly suggest you pick up this book if you’re looking for a good book to teach you to draw in cartoon style.
Next, I’m going to draw the ears. Just draw 2 inverted triangle shapes to indicate the labrador ears.
Labradors have the cutest years and because their years fold downwards, they are able to retain the cute puppy look.
After the ears, complete the rest of the face of the kawaii dog by adding two small lines underneath the years.
Now, the face is completed! All that’s left to do is to draw the body.
Step 2: Drawing the body of the kawaii labrador
When drawing kawaii animals, the head is almost as big as the body. So, keep that in mind when you’re drawing the body. It needn’t look like real life.
Let’s draw one side along with the leg.
I’m drawing one side along with the back leg of the labrador. Now let’s draw the other side.
Now, to draw the front legs of the labrador or kawaii dog, I’m just going to draw a simple “W” shape.
Remember, the simpler, the better!
And we complete the rest of the body by connecting the spaces between the legs.
The kawaii dog is almost done! Now, we just have to draw the expressions!
Step 3: Drawing the face and coloring the kawaii dog
Let’s do that by drawing some cute eyes, a nose, and a mouth.
And voila, we have a beautiful kawaii dog!
But it will look even better when we color it. When coloring animals, use photos of real animals for inspiration! I’m going to use a photo of my chocolate labrador as an example to color this dog.
First, I’m going to draw a pink mouth and make the ears darker than the rest of the body for more definition. I’m also going to add two pink circles under the eyes to give that extra kawaii effect!
If you notice, I’ve also drawn a small shape around the nose and mouth to make it look like the dog has a muzzle. This is honestly my favorite part!
You can also add wiggly lines around the tail to make it look like your kawaii labrador is wagging her tail.
I’m going to use my white labrador as an example:
And here’s the final result:
Conclusion + Drawing Resources
I hope this tutorial was super helpful to you and you were able to draw yourself a cute labrador dog or a puppy in cartoon style.
I understand that drawing animals can sometimes be challenging but once you get the hang of drawing kawaii animals, it becomes easier with practice!
You can make things easier by picking up this book on drawing kawaii animals.
If you want to see more tutorials on drawing kawaii animals and kawaii things, please leave a comment below.
I will be adding more kawaii drawing tutorials to this blog, so keep a lookout!
If you are interested in drawing in a kawaii style and then selling clipart or merchandise on Etsy, check out this course!
My old bud Ilaria (we’ve been friends on Instagram back when I had Instagram) created this course! I’ve watched her grow from 0 followers, and I’m so, so proud of her!
And believe it or not, there is not 1 single good online course about learning how to draw kawaii art and then making physical stickers on the internet. I’ve been looking for a course like this for a long, long time.
And it’s finally here!!!
You can create your own stickers and print them and sell them on Etsy or any space! She goes into detail about how to draw the characters.
This is by far one of the best courses I’ve taken that is so cute and so educational.
The course is in English, and it’s amazing!
What do you need?
A sketchbook, Photoshop, and a graphic tablet so that you can draw the kawaii characters. If you want to make stickers, you’ll need a printer and sticker sheets.
Even if you don’t want to make stickers and just draw kawaii characters, this course is perfect!
And if you are really keen on improving your drawings or you want to create cute kawaii animals and kawaii people, check out this second course by Sara.
Sara teaches you how to draw anything in a nice kawaii style. I really love these kinds of courses because they’re so easy to learn and it’s very easy to get clients because this is a really relatable drawing style.
It is in Italian but it comes with subtitles and it’s really easy to follow.
If you are just getting started with ProCreate, I highly recommend this course: Procreate for Beginners: Digital Illustration 101
Sooooooooooo pretty!!!!🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰😍😍😍
Thank you Anne, so glad you loved this cute dog drawing.
I love it to! I love all your drawings SO much, they are all so cute!!! Keep up all your great work(actually I could say amazing!)
I’m so happy you love the drawings Nora – this blog is my tiny world where I can share lots of cute stuff. Thank you! Wishing you a happy week!
Lots of love,
Angela
I only recently saw your reply! If I knew how to show you some amazing drawings I made with your drawings I would! I get most of my insparation from music, my teacher always sais that our brains are not capable of multitasking, but when I listen to music, I feel so focused. I ma listening to music as I right this. With the insparation your drawings give me combined with music, I make amazing drawings. ( my teacher specifacly sais that because everyone always listens to music while doing math😅)
sincerly,
Nora M.