Bring some colour to your life! Reeves Superior Giant Colour box. (Reeves Superior Giant Colour Box)

Member Name: GillMN

Product:	Reeves Superior Giant Colour Box
Date:	18/01/09 (139 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Every colour under the rainbow, strong and tidy box.

Disadvantages: Expensive really but good quality stuff.

This box of goodies is every young aspiring artists dream.

I have a suspicion that I really bought this because I always wanted a super-dooper one when I was a kid and we could never afford such a posh one.

The silver coloured box is solid with two front catches and a carrying handle. The pencils and paints etc all have their place and fit in neatly, this makes it easy to see if anything is missing when you put it away.

There are 24 Reeves good quality coloured pencils. The range of shades is quite comprehensive and the colours are soft enough for blending on the paper. They don't wear away too quickly and the tips don't break off with annoying frequency.

There are two sketching pencils and a sharpener and sandpaper block for sharpening. It's a nice solid double sized metal sharpener.

The discs of watercolour are a little bit shallow and don't stand up to a lot of use really. I asked in the shop about these and you can buy refills for them. I forgot to ask the price. (sorry!) Two brushes and a small pallette sit to the side of them in the box.

The oil pastels are my favourite and there are 24 of them. Again the colour range is good. If you are letting children loose with oil pastels you might want to cover or roll up their cuffs because they can be a bit messy and smudge easily. Kids do like them though because of their brightness and ease of application. (To just about anything besides the paper!)
Pastels break easily so I often wrap them in paper up to the tips to strengthen them a bit.

It's a smart kit and costs around £25.00 now. I bought mine a couple of years ago to entertain visiting kids with (well, that was my excuse anyway!) and it's still going strong.

The rubber didn't last long, but putty rubbers don't seem to. They are easy enough to replace (if I ever remember!)

It is not a cheap kit so it is really only suitable for an older child or teenager who will look after it properly. It is of course unsuitable for young children because they will almost certainly try to eat the brightly coloured contents.

We have had hours of use and fun out of it and will continue to do so by the looks of it.

The box remains tidy looking and the hinges are fine even after one young nephew managed to tread on it. I think the box did him more damage than he did to the box. (Ouch!)

Overall the quality of the contents is high. I wouldn't expect anything else from Reeves though. You can buy much cheaper kits but you would not get the same durability, colour range and quality as you have here.

I would recommend this set as a special gift or to keep in the house to entertain young friends and family. Just make sure you have plenty of spare paper ready for the young Rembrandts!

Summary: A really inspiring collection of artists materials.