If you’re a painter, you’ve surely heard the name Rosemary and Co. spoken with a religious sort of fervor. This devotion is not at all unreasonable, as Rosemary has swept though this exorbitantly expensive and frustrating market, ushering in a new era of quality, durability, and affordability (relatively speaking). Their brush offerings are ever-expanding, and they are endlessly responsive to customer feedback and artist requests, often creating custom brushes and brush sets for individual artists. And no…I don’t have one. Yet. 😉
Pro tip: when you order brushes, request a physical catalog. The brush images are all printed at 1:1 scale in the book. It’s so much easier than deciphering sizes online!
You can purchase all of these brushes at Rosemary’s website. This is an affiliate link, so I do receive a few points towards future brushes if you choose to use it. Thank you for your support!
Here are a few of my daily favorites and the reasons I reach for these brushes again and again.
Overall thoughts on Synthetic vs Natural Hair brushes:
I generally find that natural hairs do not curl with solvent use, whereas synthetic fibers do. The finer the fiber, the more noticeable and rapid this effect. Obviously avoiding solvent altogether is your greatest bet for keeping your brushes healthy. But for those of us who stubbornly use it anyway for efficiency’s sake, it’s worth considering the pros and cons in our purchases.
Synthetics are, for the most part, less expensive and require nothing from any animals.
Natural hair brushes—at least in my experience—tend to last a great deal longer. The hair has a larger “belly” for holding pigment and natural memory that makes re-forming their shapes significantly easier. Their bristles do not curl from solvent use.
The bristles of both types of brushes are dramatically impacted by scrubbing on linen/canvas!! Save your nasty old brushes for rough block-ins and textured landscapes…don’t prematurely thrust this fate upon your crisp, new brushes. Save those beauties for controlled marks!
Ivory long flats: these are my go-to favorite workhorses for everything. They are snappy and hold an excellent edge, allowing for very controlled strokes. The shovel-like tip allows for conscious brush loading and encourages a painterly, shape-oriented mentality when laying the paint down on the surface. I find it easier to create sharp edges and points and fine tapers with these. I find I use 4 and 6 the most, so I like to have at least two of each in my hand (one for lights, one for darks). At a minimum, I’d recommend one of each of these, though I truly use the full set: I like to have a full lineup with doubles of my favorites to limit solvent use between colors. The size 0 long flat is my favorite drawing brush.
Evergreen Series: These are a really nice, affordable, softer second layer brush. I prefer the longer Evergreens. They’re a good pairing with the Ivories. I particularly love the long filberts since the angular shapes from my Ivory flats are always in evidence after blocking in, and I like to soften stroke in subsequent layers. But flats and the small rounds are very useful too. Full disclosure: when left to my own devices, I will often reach for a Sable as readily as an Evergreen. I tend to suggest Evergreens on supply lists because of the price point and because many people avoid natural hair brushes for ethical reasons.
Pure Sable domed filbert series 81: I am a sable junkie. I use the whole line of sizes, especially in portraiture, but I just love the #10. This mid-sized brush is a great magic wand to have in your pocket for local wet-into-wet blending when you’ve chunkily chiseled something in and want to soften the edges. It’s also very helpful for skimming a transparent/glaze layer over a portion of a shape to darken it, especially if the under layer is not fully dry. Natural hair is resilient, beautifully kept and conditioned by the oil in my Savvy Brush Tray, and has a larger “belly”, meaning it holds more pigment than a synthetic equivalent. This is more important in watercolor, but I still find the difference to bet quite noticeable in oil, particularly when painting with medium.
Red Dot Series: This is the best synthetic sable I have ever encountered. It’s not the same as a true sable, but it’s shockingly close! They handle almost identically. The only major difference I have noticed is their vulnerability to solvent, though again, best practice is to avoid solvents altogether. If you’re choosing synthetics for ethical reasons, these will be a wonderful addition to your arsenal. I’d definitely recommend going solvent free and keeping your brushes in oil between sessions, or washing them with Richeson’s linseed studio soap during long absences from the studio.
Eclipse Comber: An edge wizard. All sizes are useful, but I use the 1/2” the most.
Masters choice fan: Everyone needs a good fan brush, or something with similar softness for blending. This one is medium soft. The harder ones tend to comb the paint rather than spreading it, and softer sable ones don’t do much at all unless you have quite a lot of wet paint on your surface. I love this brush and I’ve been using the same one, stored in oil, for about 10 years. It still looks perfect because of the gentle painting application common to fan brush use.
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