At 21 years of age, Cornelis completed a course at the Academy for Visual Arts and Technical Sciences in Rotterdam. He had always dreamt of joining his father’s company, but decided he wanted to do things differently from his father. Cornelis wanted to mechanize, simply to be able to make high-quality, affordable products for as many people as possible. With his enthusiasm and determination, Cornelis finally managed to convince his father: De Arend (The Eagle) steam factory first saw the light of day in 1897. This new factory produced wooden doors, floorboards, staircases, frames and even school desks. After a major fire in 1919, the company moved to Zaandam. During the 1920s, the demand for kitchens was slowly increasing. In 1937, they asked famous designer Piet Zwart to design a functional kitchen so it could be mass-produced in the Bruynzeel factory. The first of many famous Bruynzeel kitchens was born.

Before WOII, the Netherlands used to import pencils from Germany, Austria and the Czech Republic. After the war, pencils, as well as many other products for that matter, were only scarcely available. Cornelis Bruynzeel, already an expert on working with wood, was asked by the Dutch government to start producing pencils to help re-establish the educational system and improve employment rates. The Dutch government assisted him by providing foreign exchange to buy the necessary machines from America. But… Bruynzeel had to guarantee that he could deliver the pencils 6 months later. Though Bruynzeel was an expert in wood, the pencil business was completely new to him. This caused some issues in the beginning. After the war, commodities were scarce, so since the right materials were not available, the quality was lacking. Yet, he still managed to deliver the first batch of pencils after 6 months. After this first batch, the pencils kept increasing in quality due to various technological developments and innovations.

During the 1980s, the Bruynzeel factory decided to separate their factories, which meant both Bruynzeel kitchens and Bruynzeel pencils went on to create and further develop their own brand. Over the years, Bruynzeel has continuously optimized and improved her pencils. Today, Bruynzeel pencils are known as high-quality products. The current Bruynzeel assortment consists of a complete range of colouring materials, including anything from entry colouring products for children as young as 2 years old to a wide collection of hobby and professional tools for anyone who enjoys being creative.