Fabriano Artistico 300 lb. Soft Press 10-Pack 22x30" - Extra White

This watercolor paper is almost next to perfect. It reacts well to the pigment and is easier to lift then paper I have used for years (Arches). The only downside is the price…

Paid almost $150 for this paper after reading excellent reviews. The paper itself is wonderful . I paid more to buy the paper with the deckled edge as I wanted to display the full sheet with the deckled edge instead of using a piece of mount board. I wont be able to do that, will have to cut the paper down and lose the deckled edge ( defeats the purpose and I may as well have bought smaller , cheaper paper ) or I can use mount board to cover the ruined edge. As you can see from the photo, every corner on every side was bashed and had brown staining like this, from the cardboard box I expect. The box was far too large, the paper had been placed inside the box with no packing to stop it from moving around or protect the edges. The plastic bag it was in had ripped, obviously due to it being thrown around in the unsuitable box, and the edges and corners were bashed and brown from being thrown around unprotected against the cardboard box. Such expensive beautiful paper, ruined by lazy packaging as I cant believe anyone would be so naive as to not predicting what would happen. I noticed the supplier no longer delivers to my location, perhaps it was a mistake listing , should I be happy I received it at all in that case. It seems like someone begrudgingly threw it in the box , it would not have taken much to stick some bubble wrap around it, or on the corners at least or find a box that fit snuggly to stop it from being thrown around. So, 5 stars for the paper and one star for the packaging,

I have used Arches 300 LB cold press paper for many years and I thought I would give this soft press a try. It is somewhere between cold press and hot press. It does not absorb quite as well as cold press, but it is easy to work with. I like it much better than 100 LB cold press or hot press papers.