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So, you’re new to pastels, excited about all the beautiful colors, needing to know which ones are tried and true…

“What are the best pastels for beginners?”

This is a question I answer all the time and honestly, I never tire of talking about these beautiful sticks of soft pastel pigment! My life changed when I first picked one up and I haven’t looked back since.

I am a firm believer that you don’t have to break the bank to begin to use soft pastels. Developing your palette is a gradual process. You need to experiment to find the ones that work best for you! Instead of mindlessly collecting, be slow and intentional. Curate your style.

Curating your colors and values is personal and a wonderful adventure. I made some mistakes when I first began collecting and I’m here to tell you all about it!

I’m sharing my favorite sets for beginning pastel painters and the reasons why.

For an even more in-depth look at pastels, please visit my Resources page for a brief synopsis of many of the brands I’ll be discussing, plus some!

Chances are if you’re new to pastels and wondering which ones to choose, you’re looking at the online shops and feeling overwhelmed with choices. The possibilities seem endless and the colors are so enticing!

Before we begin to dive into which sets are the best for beginners, let’s talk about a few things regarding the medium of soft pastel.

Soft pastel has been around for thousands of years. It is the most archival of all mediums, if protected from damage. Pastel is pure pigment with a small amount of binder to hold the pigment in a stick (or pan) form. There is no oil in the pigment to degrade or yellow (as in oil paint). If you added oil to the pigment, it would become oil paint! You can create washes with pastel using a variety of wet media and this can create all kinds of fun painting effects. I demonstrate this all the time in my online courses. You can see an index of my classes here.

Note: Pastels are NOT chalks. Chalks were originally created by dying limestone. Now, chalks are generally made with calcium carbonate or gypsum. Chalk is not nearly as high in chroma or intensity as pastel. They do look the same as they are both in sticks but pastel is an entirely different medium. You may find some search engines referring to pastel art as “chalk pastels” – this is an inaccurate description of fine soft pastel art.

It is also important to note that there are differences in pastels relating to the hardness. The hardness of the pastel depends on how much binder is present and mixed into the pigment. So, you can have hard soft pastels or soft soft pastels! 😉 Many brands vary and this is why it is so important to do your research before purchasing.

When I first started painting with pastels (about 12 years ago), I immediately purchased some off-brand pastels from my local craft store. They were very inexpensive and I was unsure of which kinds to get. There are so many brands!

Usually, big box arts and crafts stores do NOT carry the finer artist grade pastels. The reason? These pastels have less binder which makes them softer and easier to break in shipping. Mostly, what you’ll find at the big box stores like Michaels, Hobby Lobby, etc. are going to be harder soft pastels. These have a lot of binder, which makes them easier to ship en masse.

So, does binder mean the pastels aren’t artist quality? Should I only buy the expensive pastels? Which are considered the softest?

These are usually the next questions I get and the answers are all across the board.

When I purchased my first sets of soft pastels, I made the mistake of buying pastels that were much too soft for my level of painting. The softer the pastel, the harder they are to control.

When you are curating your palette, you need pastels across the range of hardnesses. (You’ll eventually need those very soft pastels but I always suggest beginners lean towards the medium to harder lines FIRST).

Why?

Not only are they less expensive, they are easier to handle to create a variety of marks. You’ll also learn the feel for using the soft pastel medium and how to handle your own specific touch (how hard or gently you press down when making marks).

With pastels that are very very soft, you will run the chance of filling your tooth (the paper texture) too quickly, you’ll probably break and/or crumble them too often, and it will be harder to learn a soft layering touch.

All of this is to say, when I teach my students in my online courses and in person at my workshops, I want to avoid frustration as much as possible. When a student has a beautiful new set of very very soft pastels, it’s always harder for them.

So, without further ado, here are the sets I always recommend for beginning pastelists. These are wonderful pastels I use everyday in my practice. I personally LOVE the harder pastels for a variety of reasons and tend to choose these over very soft brands in my work.

1. Set of 48 Nupastels by Prismacolor

I love this set of pastels and use Nupastel in EVERY single painting I create. This is a good beginner set for artists and students. Nupastel has a wide range of colors and values here and this has a good breadth of saturated and more nuanced colors.

I also love their set of 96 pastels (this is the one I own) but if you’re new and unsure, the 48 is a good testing ground. Nupastels are considered amongst the hardest of the soft pastels lines. They have a lot of binder! These are consistently a good price and can last a very long time. I’ve had my set of 96 for 12 years! I have ordered some colors open stock (a la carte) to fill in gaps where I’ve used all of one color. Be warned, open stock Nupastels do come in a semi-frustrating white wrapper that can be difficult to remove. The sets do not come in wrappers, just FYI.

2. Set of 90 Half-Sticks by Rembrandt

Rembrandt’s are consistently a favorite of mine and I love this half stick set for beginners. The full sticks are gorgeous yes, but you get a lot more hues in this set for a very reasonable price! (Plus, the full sticks come in wrappers and the half sticks don’t…winning!).

I love Rembrandt’s because they are SLIGHTLY SOFTER than the Nupastels above. These are good pastels to use together and in tandem. There are several colors in the Rembrandt line that I re-order again and again. I especially love their soft peaches and warm and cool greens.

3. Set of 36 Unison Landscape Colors

Now we’re getting into some softer (but not the softest) lines of pastels. Unison pastels are consistently in my go-to colors. They have beautiful hues and values, are handmade with such great care in the UK, have a more medium softness to them, and have very thoughtful palettes.

I love this set of 36 landscape pastels. There are some nice grayed hues here as well as some good values from light to dark. This is a great set to start fleshing out your palette!

4. Maggie Price Basic Values for Terry Ludwig Pastels

This is the very first set of Terry Ludwig fine soft pastels I ever purchased and boy, am I glad I did. Terry Ludwig’s are consistently a “workhorse” pastel for many artists and these are exceptional. This set is brilliant for beginners. It has a gorgeous range of light to dark values (something missing from many sets) and the hues are tender and bold. The square shape lends itself to learning to make many types of marks.

This is a bit pricier than the previous sets but it is WELL worth the investment. You won’t regret your Terry Ludwigs!

5. Set of 40 Greys – Richeson Handrolled Pastels

Last but not least is this beautiful set of 40 grays by Richeson.

Why gray?

Grayed colors are missing from most palettes, especially when you’re a beginner. These subtle hues will make your painting sing! I love the size of these – they’re smallish but easy to handle. The paper wrappers are thin (think tissue paper) and easily removed. Look at those greens and those violet blues! If you haven’t purchased a gray set, this one is perfect and will help you achieve nuance and mood in your paintings.

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I hope this list of the Five Best Sets of Pastels for Beginners helps and inspires you! This is not a sponsored post and I have used and loved every single one of these brands.

I would love to hear from you! What’s your favorite brand? Which pastels do you turn to over and over? What else would you like to see here on The Beauty of Pastel? Let me know in the comments!

xoxo,

Bethany