What I bought in Paris- Art supply special edition

   Over the last few years I have become more and more minimal in my art supply purchases. Whether it is a feeling that there is 'nothing new under the sun' or that I have simply narrowed down those items which work for me I cannot say. Whatever the reason, I have spent less time frequenting my local art shop and more time simply creating art. And the more I create the more I find that I can mix and match materials to create the effect I want if I am missing something I planned to use.
   One place where I really enjoy browsing art stores, however, is on vacation. No matter where I go I try to find an art store and bring back a few items to try, with the unfortunate result that I often find products I love which are not available to me at home.

   Paris is filled with artists, sketchers, wanna be artists, dabblers... and to suit their various needs, art shops every 500 meters or so. While planning my trip I googled a few art stores I had hoped to visit and carefully noted down the addresses and how to get to them. This turned out to be entirely unnecessary as I stumbled across shop after shop while out walking. And although I couldn't visit them all I did visit two. Two indulgent stops along the way. Two chances to reach deep into my pockets for the 'few' items I 'needed'. Two delightful, glorious hours spent acquiring materials which have already brought me untold pleasure.
   I will provide more information about these two shops in future posts but in the meantime I would like to share the supplies I bought. I have devided them into two groups in order to indicate which items come from each individual shop should someone want to check on a product online. (Christmas is coming).

Sennelier: 

   This shop was filled to bursting with small items from a number of brands in addition to their own. I bought Sennelier watercolour tabs but also took the opportunity to try out water soluble graphite tabs, Japanese ink, and two new sketchbooks.

I chose two earth tones in the graphite tabs, and three primary colours of Japanese ink.

The sketchbooks are lovely and the one with the beautiful cover is made of rough handmade paper.

I again chose four subdued earth tones, greens, greys, browns. These will probably make it into my winter palette.

Charvin:

This shop is the antithesis of Sennelier in that it is small and offers a wide range of products made in house but nothing else. A charming shop with the capacity to create the perfect painting kit for any artist.

My biggest purchase was the watercolour palette with beautiful jewel tone colours. I will be reviewing it in a future post.

There was also a range of Gouache paints in exactly the 'right' colours. I chose the grey of the Paris
 rooftops in addition to two others.

Cash registers are dangerous. There were so many tiny little fun items at this one. I chose a small pen.

There were so many interesting things, but these are the ones I brought back. If you would like more information about any specific one let me know in the comments and I will review it in a future post.

If you likes this post you might also enjoy:

- Day trip to Maribor
- the supplies I bought in Washington DC
- Shopping Artist style
- The Pastel Plant
- Artist Holiday Gift Guide 2018

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