Derwent Pastel & Charcoal Pencil Sharpener, Manual Handheld Sharpener, Professional Quality, 0700234

Not sure why but this sharpener works so much better than any other I've tried.

This does a great job of sharpening pastel pencils without breaking them. Dont think it's just the same as a normal pencil sharpener, it isn't. Normal sharpeners will repeatedly break the soft and fragile core of a pastel pencil because the core gets jammed in the narrow end of the tapered hole and breaks. This has a cut-out in the bottom of the narrow end so the core isn't under so much torsional pressure. This means you can get a very sharp point without having to use a Stanley knife or scalpel, it's a lot quicker too.Just remember that some pastel shavings come out of the bottom cut-out of this sharpener so don't sharpen over your work unless you want random bursts of colour everywhere!It might seem a little bit pricy compared to normal plastic bodied pencil sharpeners but it's well worth the money as it does the job it's made for and does it well. I'm going to get a spare one the next time I order something from Amazon.

Good quality, will be even better if I can change blades

It seems to work where other sharpeners break the pencils. Great for pastels.

Chews the wood so not really impressed (especially since I found an old one identical in my stash which I hadn’t been using for the same reason). Plus side, it’s cheap.

Pastel pencils are ruined by standard pencil sharpeners. They break the pastel leads and can never bring the pastel to a decent point.This pastel sharpener is perfect. Couple of quid and does exactly what it's supposed to. Brilliant.One note though, you get the best result by rotating the sharpener around the pencil, instead of turning the pencil inside the sharpener.

It's sturdy, sharpens well, decent size and worth having in the class

Effective sharpener. It could be better in terms of length of the pastel pencil point. I am not a professional artist, so for this price, it is really excellent value.