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FABER-CASTELL

 

Faber-Castell was established in  the Nuremburg area of Germany in 1761, and the business is still family owned.

The two main product lines as far as we are concerned, are the Oil based Dry point Coloured Pencil  - POLYCHROMOS -

and the Water Soluble (Aquarelle) pencils branded as ‘ALBRECHT DURER’

Products are manufactured in 14 factories worldwide and the two pencil lines have a long established 120 colour range which is shared by both types of pencil.

Faber Castell also produce a leading Pastel pencil branded ‘PITT’ pastel.

This is sold in both wood cased pastel pencil form and as a solid stick of hard pastel  See the Pastel Pencil section for more information.

 

I would regard Faber-Castell Polychromos as one of the three strongest brands among Coloured Pencil manufacturers

and I have used these pencils as one of my first choices for several years

 

POLYCHROMOS are a medium soft pencil with a very smooth take up which layer well

The colour range is very strong on the reds and yellows and there are a low level of poor lightfast colours.  

Users of  Polychromos tend to be strong fans of the brand. The colour range tends to favour those who do botanical work as the flower colours are well represented.

There are a good range of greys and darks in the set.

 

As  Polychromos is an oil based product, pictures completed with Polychromos will not suffer from Wax bloom.

 

ALBRECHT DURER  watercolour pencils  (Aquarelles) have a drier feel to them than Polychromos as they lack the oil content.  

The aquarelles tend to mimic watercolours closely and the colours you would expect to behave like watercolours do so.

For example, non staining earth colours in watercolours are non staining in the Albrecht Durer range, and mixtures which granulate in watercolours do so in washes of these pigments

 

Distribution in the UK is wide and efficient and larger retailers and mail order outlets will stock single colours as well as sets.  www.saa.co.uk  ( Society for All Artists) is a good source - especially if you are eligible for a member discount and get the P & P free.

Another good source for pencil stock is Studio Arts of Lancaster, who are one of the select few independent art materials retailers left in the UK and stock all the Faber-Castell range both in boxes and single pencils and sell over the Internet.

 

For more background information, there are several Faber-Castell websites

but I find the USA one the most useful as it contains extra data on lightfastness not found elsewhere

The USA site is at     http://www.fabercastell.com/14786/Welcome/index_ebene2.aspx

The Home site in Germany is at      www.faber-castell.com/    

This link provides access to the home sites in a range of European languages

The Faber Castell ranges use a star system to indicate the light stability of the pigment in each pencil with 1 star being the lowest

rating. Whilst Faber Castell rate that as ‘good’ I would suggest that you avoid the one star colours and use mainly the 2 and 3 star colours if you can

 

For sight of the colour range, see the Penciltopics standard charts completed from the actual pencils

Faber Castell Polychromos Chart.

The Albrecht Durer colour range is the same and a separate chart will be posted in due course showing the dry and moistened colours in the Aquarelle range

Latest revision April 2010

Coloured Pencil BRANDS

LIGHTFASTNESS of pencils  1    and   LIGHTFASTNESS 2 ( some test5s carried out in strong sunlight by a reader

PRICE & CONTENT of Coloured Pencils : COLOUR COMPARISONS between brands :  

and a listing page by page of the various manufacturers selling Coloured Pencils in the United Kingdom and in Europe.

DERWENT ;  FABER-CASTELL ; CARAN d’ACHE : PRISMACOLOR ; LYRA ; STEADTLER ; ROYAL TALENS ; BRUYNZEEL ;

DALER ROWNEY ; CONTE ; CRETACOLOR.