Buying in bulk? Scroll to the bottom to find out more.
Open an account online in under two minutes and start shopping at wholesale prices straight away.
Open an account online in under two minutes and start shopping at wholesale prices straight away.
Buying in bulk for a one-off project? Spend £240 (£200 + VAT) on the website and 45% comes off at checkout.
Buying in bulk?
Oil pastels, soft pastels and charcoal for expressive drawing, life drawing and colour work. Our own oil pastels blend straight from the stick, and our soft pastel sets come in 12 or 24 colours, with a square profile for both broad strokes and sharp lines.
For drawing there's willow charcoal, compressed charcoal for deeper blacks, sketching crayons and pastel pencils for detail, and water-soluble wax pastels you can turn into a wash.
The binder. Oil pastels are held together with wax and oil, so they're creamy, bright and dust-free. Soft pastels are almost pure pigment, so they're powdery, blend easily with a finger and layer well on paper with some tooth.
Work the colours together with your finger, a paper stump or a cotton bud, or layer a light colour over a darker one. For a painterly effect, brush a little low odour turps substitute over the top.
Willow charcoal is light and easy to smudge or lift, which suits quick sketches and life drawing. Compressed charcoal is denser and darker, holds a sharper edge, and is harder to erase.
Soft pastel and charcoal do, as they smudge easily. A few light coats of fixative spray will hold them. Oil pastel never fully dries, but it doesn't dust or smudge in the same way, so frame it behind glass or store it with a sheet of paper over the top.
Paper with some tooth, which grips the pigment and lets you build up layers. A pastel paper pad or a heavier cartridge or mixed media pad works well. Smooth, thin paper fills up quickly.