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Who doesn’t love to get some of them high quality brushes? I’ve been painting since the mid-90s and if experience taught me anything it is that there’s never enough brushes to go around with. Luckily, just when I was about to sweep the Internet in search of something new, that I could feed my brush hunger with, a package from Iron Keep came in. Inside there was a trio of Fine Sable brushes that I got to test. Here’s my honest review of the three.
All three Iron Keep brushes came packaged in separate plastic tubes, accompanied by instruction manuals. Each tip was lined perfectly and secured by a protective cover. Visually appealing, the brushes made a good first impression. An original choice of colors for sure – not really my cup of tea, but I wouldn’t stress over the color of the handles – it is the head of each individual brush that I’m most interested in. In this case the tips are sharp and flexible and bellies have just enough girth and length to my liking.
There’s a lot of brushes in the market that I could compare with Iron Keep Finest Sable. For the purpose of the review I decided to compare Iron Keeps with brushes I use on a daily basis. That would be:
Citadel (Warhammer) Artificer Series: 22€-32€, daVinci Maestro series 10 (much smaller belly): ~10€, Army Painter Masterclass (smaller tips): ~10€, Green Stuff World Silver Series (lower quality): 6-10€, W&N Series 7: 17€-25€
All sizes of the Iron Keep Finest Sable brushes are about 14€-15€ each, which might be more than cheaper and arguably lower quality alternatives, but also less than Citadel Artificer series and Winsor & Newton Series 7.
In order to be thorough I took all three brushes on a four days spin. I have used the trio almost exclusively for the entirety of the latest Warhammer 40,000 Genestealr Cults commission of over two dozen miniatures. All three brushes performed admirably under my typical rigorous routine. Take note that I do not care for brushes much. These are the tools of my trade and as such, are required to carry a burden of all kinds of paints including washes, metallic pains, textures and varnishes. Not only did the Iron Keep Finest Sable emerge victorious, but I have no bad things to say about the performance. The brushes behaved just like I would imagine from other mid-high end hobby brushes.
When it comes to comfort of work and belly/tip behavior, Iron Keep overperformed compared to Green Stuff World Silver Series, DaVinci and The Army Painter. Throughout the process my impression was that the Iron Keep performed on par with Citadel Artificer and W&N Series 7, which are some of my favorite lines of brushes. Below are a few pictures of the brushes after the job was done.
Iron Keep delivered and I am genuinely happy about the three brushes. Both pricing and the quality works for me. The only issue I have is the limited choice of size. I prefer to work on slightly larger brushes and would definitely get size 3 and 4 if available. Either way this is not the last time you will see Iron Keep Finest Sable at my workbench – they now join the ranks of my favorite brush lines. Look out for yellow handles all over my workspace from now on!
Why not at the very source: Iron Keep Fines Sable
You might also find these brushes at selected online stores.
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