Standing is fine for the first hour. Somewhere in the second, the thing you are thinking about stops being the painting and starts being your lower back, and the session ends earlier than it should have. Everyone who paints outdoors works this out eventually, usually while sitting on a rock.

The Mabef M39 is a proper stool that weighs almost nothing. One kilogram of oiled Italian beech with a leather seat, rated to 90kg, sitting at a sensible 50cm. It folds flat and goes under the arm that is not carrying the easel.

Perfect for

What makes it worth owning

Why it costs more than a camping stool

Because it is made of beech and leather in Italy rather than nylon and aluminium in a factory that also makes deck chairs, and because it will outlast several of them. That is the whole argument and we will not pretend it is more complicated.

The practical version: a canvas camping stool sags in the middle, which over an hour puts you in a slouch and takes your eye line with it. A firm leather seat on a rigid frame holds you where you sat down. If you have ever finished a session outdoors and found the painting was somehow drawn from a lower angle than you thought, that is why.

Specifications

For full details of the Mabef warranty, including how to register your easel, see the Mabef warranty page.

Mabef, and why we carry so much of it

Mabef have been making easels in Italy since 1948 and have never once diversified into anything else. No brushes, no paint, no pencil cases. Just easels, for three quarters of a century, by a family who clearly think about hinges more than is strictly healthy. We find that faintly wonderful, and it shows in the joinery and in the warranty they are willing to put behind it.

Art Shed carries over forty Mabef lines, one of the deepest Mabef ranges in Australia: field easels, studio masts with cranks, lyre easels, sketch boxes, table easels, sculpture trestles, print racks, stools and the full run of beech palettes. Not a token three models and a special order form. If you are building a studio around Mabef, or matching an easel you already own, we almost certainly have the rest of the family in stock.

Questions about the Mabef M39 Folding Stool