Viarco, a small traditional pencil manufacturer in Portugal, continues to innovate.

The ArtGraf pencils are a pair of 22cm black and white pencils. The matte black finished “Soft Black” is a carbon based pencil, while the glossy white finished “Water-Soluble” is, as the name states, a water soluble pencil.

The format and presentation are unique and compelling, yet modest. Pencils of this dimension are truly unusual (a standard pencil is about 17.5cm) , and the combination of the two artist specialty formulas results in a very nice product.

The specific formulas may be a matter of prefence (I found the Caran d’Ache water soluble pencils easier to use as a beginner), but it is hard to imagine than anyone who likes graphite based artistic media would not be impressed by a gift of ArtGraf pencils.

turn it is a wooden top whose axis is a woodcase pencil.

The packaging tells me that the design is by Miguel Soeiro and was produced by ESAD.CR and Viarco.

This is a short video showing the top in action. Depending on your browser, it will open inline in a new window, or download as an .mp4 file:

That was with minimal spin. You can get much more “air time” with practice, and the patterns left by the pencil also become quite intriguing:

I’m sure a crafty person could build something like this on their own. Do you like it?

Matthias of Bleistift also received a few of these from Sean, and seeing my post, took pity on me and kindly redirected a few spares my way.

More recently, I learned of the limited edition (I have box no. 296) World Press Cartoon pencil.

Here they are:

The blue pencil is meant to fill out J. C. Penney surveys, and the purple (and hexagonal) pencil is a souvenir from an international cartoonist conference, and was made by Viarco of Portugal.

With a regular pencil for contrast:

I remain amazed that pencils can be manufactured at this scale. Have you encountered pencils like this?

We have seen some specialty pencils from Viarco of Portugal, namely the Violeta Copia copying pencil and the Olympico and Comercial red and blue pencils. Today we’ll venture into more mainstream territory.

For those who didn’t read those articles, I’ll restate that “Viarco is a 94 year old pencil company from João da Madeira, Portugal, who produce a wide range of pencils – writing pencils, drawing pencils, carpenter’s pencils, and yes, even copying pencils and red and blue pencils – with a staff of twenty-eight!”

The Desenho Premium is made from incense cedar, and finished in matte black (including the cap). With silver lettering, it is an appealing combination.

Hexagonal, the pencil comes factory sharpened, and is easily resharpened. Like other matte finish pencils, the grip is excellent.

The pencil’s weak point is the lead. To me, it seems just average in smoothness, or perhaps slightly above average. While still a very good office pencil, I was disappointed that the Desenho Premium wasn’t just a bit more “premium”.

One of these persistent genres seems to be the “multiplication pencil” – a pencil for children with a printed multiplication table.

The three in the photos are of particular interest, as they bear the marks of the pencil companies that made them – Lyra, Musgrave, and Viarco.

I would say the Lyra, the sole triangular pencil, is the nicest writer. It appears to use jelutong wood.

Do you have recollections of seeing or using pencils like these?

ArtGraf is a tablet of watersoluble graphite in a tin.

While there are a few watersoluble graphite pencils and crayons on the market, this is the first larger format offering aimed at brush users that I’m aware of.

Viarco, a small Portuguese pencil company that we’ve mentioned once before, introduced ArtGraf last year.

The product extends watersoluble graphite possibilities, and truly allows painting in graphite. A wet brush is applied to the tablet. Varying the brush wetness and tablet contact result in varying graphite densities.

I truly think this is a great product.

Further reading:

Reuters article on ArtGraf

Official product page (in Portuguese)

Many of us may not have heard of Viarco. They are a 94 year old pencil company from João da Madeira, Portugal, who produce a wide range of pencils – writing pencils, drawing pencils, carpenter’s pencils, and yes, even copying pencils and red and blue pencils – with a staff of twenty-eight!

Their website is a breath of fresh air compared to many pencil industry sites, revealing considerable pride in their history, as well as many details about the pencil manufacturing process. Sample fact – graphite cores are baked at 1020ºC.

I was really happy when Gunther kindly sent me a couple of Viarco’s red and blue pencils.

The pencils are the 289 Viarco Comercial (regular size, hexagonal) and 293 Viarco Olimpico (oversize, hexagonal).

The lead centering isn’t the best.

My first pleasant surprise was realized while attempting to sharpen the Comercial – it doesn’t fit in some sharpeners! It is the unreformed size of pencils that were made fifty years ago, though the edges are rounded, like modern pencils.

Both the Comercial and Olimpico sharpened easily. I don’t know what wood they use, but it looks like cedar to me.

The second surprise was the rich, vibrant marks they make. The Olimpico in particular is among the best of the red and blue pencils I’ve yet seen. The Comercial’s blue is also good, but the red is more of a red-orange.

If I could buy them locally, I would get a huge stash of the Olimpico. It writes extremely well, and is very easy to use. Some of the other red and blue pencils I’ve seen, like colour pencils in general, have a tendency for the leads to easily break – but not the Viarco pencils.

I’ve tried to email Viarco more than once, and haven’t yet heard from them. That’s okay. With twenty-eight employees, I imagine that their correspondence staff might be busy in the paint booth, or be driving a forklift.

So about our original questions – let’s hope there is still room for great smaller manufacturers like Viarco, who have done a great job with these pencils.

Further on red and blue pencils:

From penciltalk.org:
Red and Blue pencils
Red and Blue pencils II
Television! (The Conté Television 649 red and blue pencil)

From stdk.de:
Rot-Blau-Stifte