So the other day I was in Wet Paint and I saw a pad on display—Fabriano Mixed Media Paper in a 9 x 12 inch pad from Savoir Faire. There were 150 sheets in the pad. It was on sale for $15.99. (Which meant each sheet was about 10 cents which is a great deal when you go through paper like I do.)
I bought some, brought it home, and liked it so much after just making this one sketch that I talked about the pad on my Instagram account.
Then I made the video at the bottom of this post.
Before posting today I learned that Wet Paint had sold out of the pads. Whether they can get more is still up in the air.
But on my Instagram feed someone mentioned that she found this paper under the DeSerres store label in Canada.
Look, it’s not like I have spies everywhere, but I do happen to have a favorite student in Canada. He went to his local DeSerres store and picked up a pad and sent me a couple sheets of the paper.
I’ve looked at them under a loop and they have the same texture. They seem like the same weight. (I’ll have Dick measure it when he gets home; I don’t know where he keeps his micrometer.)
I am 95 percent sure they are the same paper.
So while we don’t know yet if we’ll be able to get the paper in the US again, at least Canadians can check out the paper and enjoy it as I explain in the video.
If Wet Paint gets more of these pads I’ll let you know.
If you enjoy watching someone testing paper (I know that’s a limited group of people), and following my thought process about what I’m looking for in a mixed media sketch paper then I encourage you to take a look at the video.
I include a tape test to see how this paper holds up to masking with two different types of artist tape. That’s actually the reason I made the video—I love pulling tape off on camera, waiting to see if the paper tears! We all have to have our hobbies.
If the video doesn’t show up in the post you can view it at this link in YouTube.
Hahahaha Roz…. now we all want to be your favourite student in
Jen, you are all my favorites, but then as the saying goes, on some days some are more favorite than others! Phyllis was wonderful in that she just told people, sometimes not even in context of the current conversation, that Dick was her favorite.
Hi Roz—dickblick.com has it for 19.99
Thanks so much for letting me know this!!!!
The only thing better than watching paint dry is watching masking tape being pulled!!! Its like seeing a sketch being matted and framed. I haven’t received your Savoir Faire samples of this paper yet so haven’t been able to compare it to the DeSerres version. Thanks for the info about this great economical paper. Also, I loved watching you play with that brush pen and Carl :o).
Paul the samples are coming (no fibs!) Let me know what you think. That wasn’t Carl—that was EDGAR. I think it’s time I do an introduction to all my studio crew! But the video would be an hour long!
THANKS, ROZ!!!! So fun to watch some live testing. Nice to see you back at it with gusto.🤓 ( Now of course, would love to see a walkthrough of your new camera set-up made from the PVC 😉👍). Looking forward to whatever is next!!!
Glad you enjoyed the video. I’ll have to get Dick to write something about that camera stand as he made it and I did not pay attention. It isn’t new (it’s about 18 to 24 months old now, but it doesn’t get used often for a host of reasons). Working on a different set up with a friend so I can be at the drawing board. We’ll see how that goes.
Hi, Roz. Now, why didn’t I think of sending you some samples of the Deserres paper? Glad to hear that you got some from another student. I find the paper similar to the Alpha series of the Stillman & Birn sketchbooks. I couldn’t find where you had test the Alpha series particularly, although I see you have used a couple of the other ones.
I’ll have to add you to my list of possible spies, er, I don’t have spies…
I don’t like any of the Stillman & Birn papers I’ve tried over the years. The first one may have been Alpha. I recollect it was light weight and I could make it do some stuff, but only with effort that isn’t necessary with all the other papers I love, most of which area less expensive. I also didn’t care for the binding, though I think they aren’t doing the hard cover binding any more except on spirals (which I also don’t use).
I bought this and needed to see what I could use it for, I’m glad the video was very informative and I love the artworks.
Hope you enjoy it. Hope you didn’t get confused and get the Fabriano 1264 series of papers because they have a Multimedia paper I don’t care for, I mention this next week in another post on working on this original paper.