Finding a truly unusual notebook is a bit of a feat for me these days so when I stumbled across the Nuuna notebooks at Vanness Pen Shop a couple weeks ago, I was blown away at the innovation and playfulness. I decided to try the Nuuna Inspiration Mood Notebook ($34). It’s 13cm x 19cm (roughly 5″ x 7.5″) with heavyweight cardstock covers printed with a spray paint-style white design on the cover. It looks like a silkscreen print as the white ink feels tactile and very opaque.
While there are not a lot of the accoutrements normally expected with the modern notebook like a back pocket for ephemera or ribbon bookmark, the Nuuna Mood notebook is special in its own way.
Inside is where the magic happens. The pages are printed in an array of undulating hues like skyscapes. Each two page spread looks like a horizon line of some sort to me. It’s like looking out on a foggy morning or staring up at the sky as the sun sets. Maybe you see the shoreline on a foggy day? Whatever the softly shifting colors evoke, you are bound to be inspired to pick this book up just to thumb through the array of colors.
I decided to run the paper through a whole variety of pen and pencil tools to see how it performed. This is definitely the kind of notebook that would be fun to experiment with not just regular pens but brush pens, colored pencils, markers and other tools. I wanted to try them all.
And now for the pen worthiness of this paper. I’m delighted to say that, even with the heavy application of ink to create the “moods,” I didn’t have many issues using the paper. Yes, it’s a bit more absorbent than other papers that might be more specifically designed for fountain pens but there was bound to be a trade-off for the magical color. There was some bleed through with wetter inks and heavier coverage but I plan to set aside a few pages in the back for testing pens as I go along so that I can keep the front of the book looking good and make a mess in the back.
This is the reverse of my test page and it really didn’t show through much. In person, I can see a little bit more. I just happened to luck out and the Aurora Flex nib pen landed right where the darkest printing is on the reverse side so it obscured the tiny dots of showthrough. There are a few dots further up the page where I was using the wet deAtramentis in my Pilot Decimo. You may be able to see the dots just to the right of the spine in the light blue area at the top of the page. Overall though, the paper handled the pens quite well.
To push my luck, I pulled out some folded nib dip pens and really ladled the ink onto the paper. It definitely blobbed and bled at this volume of application. I think the bleeding had as much to do with my over-enthusiastic folded pen as it did for the paper.
As expected. you can see the writing through onto the reverse side of the paper in bloops and blobs. Considering the size and volume, I don’t see as much as I thought I would.
Overall, this notebook is a lot of fun to use and it definitely brightens my spirits. I am looking forward to some creative experiments like adding various brush pens, opaque gel pens and other unique tools that don’t often get used in my collection.
Even if you only intend to jot notes, this would definitely make a budget meeting more pleasant.
DISCLAIMER: Some of the items included in this review were provided free of charge for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.
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