Big congrats to the winner of our Everyday Explorers Stamp Set giveaway:
Thanks to everyone who entered the giveaway.
Show your support to Everyday Explorers for generously donating the stamps and clear block for this giveaway by ordering your favorite stamp set! Thanks!
This past week was full of news about Lamy. We already posted about the sale of Lamy to Mitsubishi but Friday every phone at the Baltimore Pen Show lit up like the ink equivalvent of an Amber Alert when the NYTimes article about Lamy’s re-release of Dark Lilac was published. There were many comments about how it must have clearly been a slow news day if the NYTimes was writing about fountain pen ink inconsistencies. Fountain Pen Memes got to talk with an executive at Lamy about all the Dark Lilac hullaballoo and cleared up some of the questions many of us had on the topic.
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In my ongoing quest to explore all that is peach ink, I liked the look of Pennonia Ragi Bubblegum ($16 for 60mL). While Americans often think of bubblegum as intensely pink, this one has those peach tones I was looking for!
According to Pennonia, Ragi Bubblegum is a pastel coral peach with medium shading. I would say the pastel, coral and peach are right on, though I think the shading is debatable.
In heavy applications like with a q-tip or ink splotch, you can definitely see the shading.
But when I get around to doing handwriting samples in nibs, I think this one is way too light to read as the nibs get finer.
The color itself is very pretty, and when I compare it to my trusty swatches you can see it fits in between the reddish/pink version of coral, and the melon-y orange Iwi ink I looked at last. I feel like I’m honing in on what I’m looking for, but I’m not there yet!
DISCLAIMER: Some of the items included in this review were provided to us free of charge for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.
Thanks to everyone for entering the giveaway fort the OEDA Letterpress Two Color Paper Notebooks. It was fun to see what papers you love!
My answer is: all of them! I know that’s cheating, but I like quite a few papers – Tomoe River for it’s sheen, dot grid for the format, and especially the slightly thicker, toothier papers.
It turns out both of our winners love Claire Fontaine, among others:
Congratulations to Ingrid and Meriah!
I remembered seeing the Everyday Explorers table in San Francisco last year but never got a chance to purchase anything so I was delighted to see Christine and her wonderful rubber stamps while I was in LA. I grabbed the Currently Inked set (3″x4″ for $10.99) and Pen and Paper set (4″x6″ for $19.99) for myself.
The stamp sets come in a sturdy clear plastic sleeve and each sheet has a thinner clear sheet on the front and back. The thinner front sheet is printed with the design below. The stamps are sticky so they stick to the plastic. To use, just peel the design off the backing sheet.
Each set comes with wonderful, well-written instructions on how to mount it onto the sturdy acrylic block to use the design. Then, it acts as a regular stamp that can be pressed onto and ink pad and then onto your paper.
I used an old acrylic block that I had in my stash so for longer stamps, I had to turn it sideways to fit on to the block.
They print very crisply with very little pressure. Clear stamps are a bit softer than red rubber so you don’t need to push as hard to get a good clean impression.
I mixed and matched the stamps to create a little testing page for some of the inks I purchased at the show.
Then I added some “currently inked” pens to the page.
The stamps are super easy to use and the design is A+. The biggest issue you’ll have is choosing which stamps to purchase.
Christine at Everyday Explorers provided us with two stamp sets to giveaway: New Pen Day ($19.99) and At The Pen Show ($10.99) plus a 3″x3″ acrylic block ($6). I threw in the new Ranger Archival Ink Pad in Jet Black ($8) (this ink is permanent so once the ink is dry, you can apply fountain pen ink over it and it will not smudge). We will pick one winner who will get all four items.
TO ENTER: Leave a comment below and tell us which set is your favorite. Play along and type in something. It makes reading through entries more interesting for me, okay? One entry per person.
If you have never entered a giveaway or commented on the site before, your comment must be manually approved by our highly-trained staff of monkeys before it will appear on the site. Our monkeys are underpaid and under-caffeinated so don’t stress if your comment does not appear right away. Give the monkeys some time.
FINE PRINT: All entries must be submitted by 10pm CST on Friday, March 8, 2024. All entries must be submitted at wellappointeddesk.com, not Twitter, Tumblr or Facebook, okay? Winner will be announced on Monday. Winner will be selected by random number generator from entries that played by the rules (see above). Please include your actual email address in the comment form so that I can contact you if you win. I will not save email addresses or sell them to anyone — pinky swear. If winner does not respond within 5 days, I will draw a new giveaway winner. Shipping via USPS first class is covered. Additional shipping options or insurance will have to be paid by the winner. We are generous but we’re not made of money. US and APO/AFO only, sorry.
Review by Tina Koyama
Anyone who has ever glanced through my personal blog knows that I’m a fude nib fan. Let’s just say I’ve tried “a few.” My very first that got me hooked on exploring others was the entry-level Sailor Compass Fude de Mannen (55-degree angle). After upgrading a few notches, the Compass is not one I reach for much anymore, but it’s still the one I recommend to others as a good gateway fude. When I heard about Sailor’s Hocoro dip pen with a fude nib, my curiosity was piqued (and obviously any self-respecting fude pen collection shouldn’t be without a dip version). The pen + Sailor Dipton Mellow Forest ink limited edition set ($29) was irresistible.
First, just a word about the compact, clever packaging: I love boxes that can be completely disassembled and flattened with no trace of adhesive holding it together – just well-designed folds and notches. Industrial origami!
The only difficulty with the whole set was pulling the nib out of the sparkly, transparent barrel that houses it. It’s a little too short to grip easily and also pull, so I had to use a sticky plastic sheet that I use to open jar lids to get a grip. After a few more pushing-ins and pulling-outs, it became a little easier.
Instructions in Japanese only are included, but I’m going to assume they’re not important for use, which I found intuitive: Pop the nib onto the barrel, and you’re good to go.
Compared to the 55-degree Compass Fude de Mannen, the Hocoro nib is slightly less angled and just a smidge more rounded instead of sharply angled, which makes it very smooth and easy to use, even for a beginner. If it were a fountain pen, I would recommend it to the fude-curious over the Compass.
Sailor Dipton Mellow Forest Shimmer ink (20ml for $24 if purchased separately) is a cool, dark emerald. The package illustration indicates that the ink should be shaken before use. It settles almost immediately, however, so it must be reshaken before every dip if you want to continue seeing shimmer. JetPens’ product information warns that the ink should be used with dip pens only, as “the glitter may cause clogs in fountain pens.”
I made test swabs, scribbles and sketches on two types of paper: Sakae TP Iroful and Col-o-ring Oversize. For basic line strokes, the fude nib makes a good range from thin to thick, including the thinnest when reversed. I admit, I rarely use fude nibs to write with, but for sketching, I can tell you that nothing makes so organic and fluid a line as a fude and a wet-flowing ink. As such, I especially enjoy sketching trees with a fude.
As expected, Mellow Forest’s shimmer is more evident on Iroful paper than on Col-o-Ring, but there’s no shortage of sparkle even on the latter. (I can see why it might clog a fountain pen.)
I must say that I was impressed by how much ink the nib holds. The sketch made on the Iroful paper, about 2 ½-by-3 inches, was completed with one dip! The other sketch, about the same size, on Col-o-ring paper took two dips because I used the nib sideways to draw the shadows, which put out a lot of ink. Still, that’s an excellent ink load for a dip pen.
I would go so far as to say that the Hocoro is the first modern dip pen nib I’ve tried that is a clear improvement over traditional dip pens in terms of ink load. And even better than the entry-level Sailor Compass fude? Win-win!
Tina Koyama is an urban sketcher in Seattle. Her blog is Fueled by Clouds & Coffee, and you can follow her on Instagram as Miatagrrl.
Ana and I were gobsmacked today by the press release that the Mitsubishi Pencil Company has acquired LAMY! If you hadn’t heard, or read the release yet, go do it. Then come back and let’s chat.
Ok, so I’m the first person to admit that I haven’t really been enamored with the LAMY Safari or the AL-Star. I have a slight preference for the metal bodied AL-Star, but in general I find the angled grip uncomfortable. However I have used quite a few of their other pens and enjoyed them through the years. I also love that the nibs are interchangeable on a lot of the pens and that they are so easy to buy and switch out.
That said, I feel like what we’ve seen in the last few years, particularly in colorways of the year is a lot of recycling and renaming. I can’t argue with wanting to collect all the colors – who doesn’t need a rainbow of pens? But this years Safaris look an awful lot like Vibrant Pink and Dark Lilac. Even if the inks are different, body colors feel really familiar. Same with the 2023 editions – anyone remember the ever so slightly paler pastels (which reminded me of Jordan almonds). I wonder if new ownership will breathe some life back into the brand?
What do you think? We want to know!
