Clairefontaine - Ref 96115C - Pastelmat Pastel Card Pad No.5 (12 Sheets) - 360gsm Card - 30 x 40cm - Assorted Colours - Specially Formulated for Use with Pastels

I bought this paper as I've read you can get amazing results with it using colored pencil. I liked how it worked with CP; however I really became enamored with it while playing with pastels. I think it is better suited for pastel work. I love the tooth, it isn't too gritty has a fairly smooth feel to it and the hard back will make it easy to mat/frame. I'm probably not doing CP work on this support correctly, but I sure like the outcome with pastels. And the tooth won't eat up your CP as much as regular sanded paper. It's worth the price.

Love this paper! So easy to create pastel art on this paper!

A very good paper for my style of work. It is remarkably smooth for the amount of pastel it can hold. I can layer, blend, and rework my subjects and not worry too much about damaging the surface. Sometimes there are lines that look like a sort of grain across the paper, but as I usually cover the entire paper with pastel it is not noticeable in the end. My only wish is that Amazon used greater care when shipping fragile art supplies.

I like the product but don’t get why it’s so expensive

The white Pastelmat is great, it takes watercolor for underpainting incredibly well -- it diffuses into the paper just like good cotton paper. And it performs like a sanded surface without the sand. (Apparently it has a cork surface to hold the pastel). But my pad came shrink wrapped -- good, except it was wrapped too tightly and it warped the pad. I taped a piece down and watercolored it, left it to dry several days, thought this would flatten the paper. It seemed to for a bit, then went back to the warped state! I guess I will buy from Blick next time.

I bought Pastelmat a year ago that did not have this problem. When my paper arrived today it had a little crunchie in the corner of the pad from being shipped from the UK, not to bad so I thought the paper would be ok otherwise but I was shocked when I opened the shrink wrap on the pad. Every sheet had these little white spots embedded in the paper, more noticeable on the dark sheets. One of the anthracite sheets had a big scuff mark. One of the white sheets had a dark spot and black specks. This appears to be manufacturing defects, as the white spots will not come off, they are in the paper. One of the sheets had a wrinkled glassine sheet as if it had been opened before. I am including photos of all these sheets. I am in the US so this paper is very expensive and comes from the UK. I called Amazon with my complaint as it will be hard to draw on this paper with all the defects. Just want everyone know to be careful as my pad came with defects on every sheet. I am very very disappointed. UPDATE: I have contacted Clairfontaine directly and they stated there was a defective run that has been corrected at their manufacturing facility. Some of the defective batch had already been sent to distributors, thus difficult to track. They stand behind the quality of their product and sent me full replacements for my defective Pastelmat. I received absolutely perfect Pastelmat in just a few days! So just be aware that some of the 3rd party sellers may have defective batches in their inventory. Pastelmat is really unique and excellent for both colored pencils and pastels. I highly recommend this product!

I only use Claire Fontaine pastel mat when painting with pastels. I have found no other paper that compares. Paper matters when you are painting professionally and as a hobby. When you don’t have the correct paper, it gets frustrating and your desire to further improve with that medium is gone. You never know when a masterpiece will be created so start off right. Claire Fontaine is the paper to use. Just wish larger sizes were offered in Amazon in Claire Fontaine

Clairfontaine pastelmat was a little difficult to get used at first. but once I did, I found it to be superior material for pastel art work. It is a little difficult to blend pastel on pastelmat the way I normally did with Uart. It is better to use the pan pastel spreader than pipe foam insulation that I normally used on Uart. The pastel really sticks well to pastelmat and the colors seem bright and less prone to smudging. Pastelmat is velvety to the touch rather than like sandpaper. I am very pleased with the results and highly recommend it.

Llegó muy bien y el material es excelente

Das beste Pastellpapier! Teuer, aber jeden Cent wert. Früher habe ich meine Pastellzeichnungen immer auf Tonpapier oder dickem Zeichenpapier angefertigt. Das ging auch, aber man muss es ehrlich sagen: Das Pastelmat Pastellpapier von Clairefontaine ist einfach die beste Wahl. Es zeichnet sich durch eine einzigartige, samtige Oberfläche aus, die ganz bewusst zwischen klassischen sandpapierartigen Pastellpapieren und glatteren Velours-Papieren angesiedelt ist. Diese fein strukturierte Oberfläche sorgt dafür, dass Pigmente, egal ob weiche Pastelle, Pastellstifte, PanPastel oder sogar harte Medien sicher und tief aufgenommen werden. Der sogenannte „tooth“ (dt. „Zahn“) des Papiers, also die Menge an Pigment, die es aufnehmen kann, ist um ein vielfaches höher als bei jedem anderen Papier das ich kenne. Besonders wenn man mit vielen übereinander gelagerten Schichten arbeitet, ist das ein unverzichtbares Qualitätsmerkmal. Ich persönlich stecke immer sehr viel Zeit und Mühe in meine Bilder und mache nur selten schnelle Skizzen. Für letztere nutze ich dann normales Zeichenpapier, da mir das teure Pastelmat dafür zu schade ist. Für ausgearbeitete Bilder nehme ich mittlerweile nur noch Pastelmat, am liebsten in den Farben Anthrazit, Blau oder Grün. Leider enthalten die gemischten Blöcke immer auch hellere Varianten, die ich viel seltener nutze. Ein Block nur mit dunklen Schattierungen wäre super!

Pastelmat is really in a category of it's own as a "paper". Nothing comes close in terms of providing the amount of "tooth" to catch pigment without feel abrasive on your hand as you work on it. Although people can assume it is purely for pastels given the name, and it is phenomenal for those (both chalk and oil pastels), it is also amazing with coloured pencils and will increase the vibrancy of your colours due to the amount of pigment it takes. It is sufficiently thick (360gsm) it can be regarded as card and detaches readily from the pad to which it is lightly glued on one edge. It is available in several sizes depending on your needs and can just be detached and used for a great result. The quality is phenomenal but is not cheap so is something you would generally reserve for final works. Do note that the surface is so different to drawing and multimedia papers it is vital to re-swatch your pastels/coloured pencils on this if you haven't used it before. I would also comment that the black pastelmat is actually more of a very dark grey than a true black.

Fun

Carta professionale per disegni con pastelli o gessetti! Felicissima dell'acquisto