Da Vinci Casaneo Synthetic Squirrel Mop - Vegan Pro

The synthetic brush that outperforms natural squirrel — the Urban Sketchers' choice

Da Vinci, based in Germany, invented the multi-diameter synthetic brush concept in 1983. The Casaneo takes this further with 'wavy fiber' — a crimped synthetic filament in five different diameters that, working together, produce the water-holding capacity of natural squirrel hair while returning to a point more reliably than the natural material. Natural squirrel mop brushes hold enormous amounts of water but are notoriously difficult to control at the tip — the soft, undifferentiated hairs tend to collapse rather than return to a defined point after a stroke. The Casaneo's multi-diameter synthetic fiber addresses this directly: each hair's crimp and diameter is chosen to create a fiber bed that both holds water and snaps back. It has become the default travel and field brush for the Urban Sketchers movement — artists who work quickly, outdoors, with watercolour and ink — because it combines the generous water-holding of a mop with enough point control for expressive field work.

Vegan and ethically produced — with certified sustainable materials

The Casaneo is 100% synthetic — no animal hair of any kind. Da Vinci's German manufacturing uses certified green processes with sustainable wood handles from European forests. For practitioners who choose synthetic brushes for ethical reasons but have found that other synthetic brushes do not have the water-holding capacity they need for wash work, the Casaneo is the answer — it holds significantly more water than most synthetic rounds while returning to a defined point.