A wonderful, versatile medium. One which benefits very well from the "less is more" approach for maintaining its freshness and glow on the paper. Over working or muddied watercolours are one of the most prevalent errors made when using this medium.
All my watercolour pieces viewed here were completed on cold press illustration boards or on stretched 300 lb watercolour paper. I work semi dry with watercolour, using a combination of washes and glazes as well as dry brush technique to create textures, and line emphasizing when needed. I prefer to manually work around my whites and highlights, rather than use any sort of masking techniques. This I feel gives me a strong ability to control edge softness and gradients within the highlights, leaving the white of the paper for very strong highlights. As well, I am a big fan of the scrub back technique to create subtle lights in darker areas. The board and papers I use are very forgiving.