If you’re addicted to office supplies, you might want to check out this Buzzfeed article from yesterday. On the other hand, you might want to have money left over to pay bills, so whatever you do, don’t investigate these translucent ghost sticky notes, or this totes adorbs set of stacking wooden boxes, or this freakin’ adorable otter-shaped tape dispenser. AHHHHHH.
I mean: ooooOOOOOOooh.
Photo courtesy Loren Elliott.
If you’ve been paying much attention to the “slow writing” community, you’ll remember a few uproars within the last year after various prominent journals published columns on the death of writing as our grandparents knew it. (Who can forget Nick Bilton’s melodratic opener to his eulogy to the pen?) These articles which fret over waning interest in writing forecast a return to darker times when we used our fingers as stylii, our mobile screens providing the proverbial dust in which we scratch out our barbarian acronyms. We know, of course, that the world isn’t abandoning slow writing just yet, and we know that slow writing can coexist with digital media because it provides a unique experience that the instant gratification of a text message can’t replicate.
But these articles are good for something other than exciting intergenerational tension. Last week, traditional letter-writing made front page news in my little Midwestern town in a report about a course at the university on the fine art of the letter. Marty Townsend, an English professor at the University of Missouri, received a grant from our Campus Writing Program to teach a course she designed — inspired by one of the aforementioned articles — called The Letter As Genre. My initial reaction on seeing the headline was pure frustration — frustration that I’d missed out on the class!
In addition to writing letters of their own, students “studied different kinds of letters, including correspondence written in the Middle Ages and letters from Martin Luther King Jr […,] pored over letters from politicians and soldiers, friends and lovers [, and] read the love letters from John and Abigail Adams, Warren G. Harding, Virginia Woolf and others.” Some students reported taking up letter writing on their own time because of the class.
You can read the article in full here. I’m including the full text beneath the cut here so it’s still accessible after the article locks to subscribers only.
Image from dear-data.com
Information designers Giorgia Lupi and Stefanie Posavec have been engaged in a curious kind of correspondence for the past 28 weeks: postcards featuring meticulously hand-drawn compilations of “small data” generated in their daily lives.
Each postcard features a kind of graph on one side: from a collection of colorful circles, composed of hash marks and resembling Old Gallifreyan script, that report phone usage to a series of what appear at first glance to be very odd musical phrases and turn out to be a graph of “musical complaints.” The other side of each postcard offers a legend to reading the graph.
They plan to spend a year on the project, which they are calling Dear Data. You can see the whole thing here at their website. Definitely take some time to browse through the images collected there. It’s a fascinating approach to correspondence, art, information and graphic design, and journaling, one that could prove inspirational for many of us humble pen bloggers/correspondees/diarists/note-takers/marginalia artists/what-have-you. After all, many of us could consider ourselves “information designers” of a sort!
Recently I found myself writing a letter to a friend who resolved to be a better letter-writer this year. It’s been almost a year since I myself started my letter-writing project (the first anniversary is in March), and while I’ve written more letters over these past eleven months than I have in the rest of my years combined, I know I too have room for improvement. However, I’ve also developed a system that helps hugely in the turnover rate of my correspondence. This how-to post serves not only as advice for pen-friends looking to streamline their postal process, but as a reminder to myself of the reasons why this blog even exists!
1. Find a Container
Get yourself a box or a special, durable folder in which to stash your correspondence gear. Portability is a top priority here, but if your container is also attractive and unique you’ll use it more often. I have an A4-sized cardboard document folio for this purpose, emblazoned with a map of Germany, which not only serves as a quick reference tool but is also a good conversation starter! My friend Maria gave it to me and I think they are fairly common in Germany, sold as Sammelboxen or Heftboxen. These cardboard boxes also work well as a lap-desk if you take your kit to go.
Here is a German-language site where you can order all different kinds of cool Heftboxen, including the one pictured above! I like this one with black and white flowers, this map of Europe, and the map of the world. But I’d add the Rolling Stones one to my collection in a heartbeat.
Assemble the Essentials
Then assemble a collection of everything you need to write AND SEND a letter:
An anecdote: just as I was writing this, my supervisor sighed and muttered to herself, “No stamp.”
“Do you need a stamp?” I asked her across our desks, trying to conceal my eagerness and failing pretty badly.
She said yes, starting to laugh at herself. She told me she’d gotten this important letter all ready to send off but had completely forgotten a stamp at home.
“I have stamps!” I offered. “What kind would you like?”
“Oh, just a plain first-class forever stamp.”
“Yes, but what kind?” I prompted. “I have Year of the Ram, Batman, Jimi Hendrix, famous choreographers, Harry Potter, Civil War battles, birds, flowers, 2013 and 2014 Christmas, and Hudson River School stamps….” I didn’t even mention the international and alternate denominations. “Plain” is not a word that exists in my stationery vocabulary.
I keep extra fun things in my letter kit, especially stickers — check out those Karas Kustoms decals and the puffy fox stickers! I have a transparent file to hold my stamps and stickers, and an accordion file (not pictured) for note- and post-cards, plus any interesting flyers or paper ephemera my penpals might like. Also: nifty canceled stamps from far-off friends. These are fun to decorate envelopes with.
How To Use
When you get a letter, if you can’t answer it immediately, put it somewhere you can’t forget about it. I’ll often put mine on my laptop or at my place at the breakfast table, where I take care of most of my correspondence.
As soon as you get a chance, sit down at a table or a desk with the letter and your kit and answer it. Try to do it all in one go. Don’t worry about your letter not being long enough; sometimes you just have time for a couple of pages. Anyway, when was the last time you got a letter and were disappointed because it wasn’t eight pages long?
Seal, address, and stamp it immediately and go stick it in the mail. If you’re like me, the process gets hung up at this stage, so be extra vigilant here.
Et voila! You’ve become a prompt penpal!
Extras
The advanced letter writing kit also contains:
Handmade envelopes
A writing mat
Washi tape
Rubber stamps and multicolored stamp pads
Small scissors
Glue
Crayons, colored pencils, or markers
Custom address labels and/or address stamp
Letter Writers Alliance membership card ($5 for lifetime membership!)
Guide to postage prices (ask or leave a note for your post person)
A guide to correspondence etiquette (take it with a grain of salt or leave it)
Familiarity with a few topical/epistolary novels, e.g. The Sorrows of Young Werther, Love in the Time of Cholera, or Ella Minnow Pea (just kidding — but it’s good to have a couple of relevant passages memorized that you can whip out and impress your penpals with!)
I also keep a record of incoming and outgoing mail. To get the Penventory look: order one $10 set of Field Notes’ “Ambition” edition. Use the olive-green ledger to record each piece of mail that passes through your fingers. Like so:
At a single glance I can see if there are any letters that need replying to and I also have a physical record of my productivity! And the subject helps me keep track of dozens of conversations (because who can remember what they cooked for dinner last night, let alone whether they’ve told a penpal XYZ?).
The most important element of your correspondence kit: creativity! Feel free to “think outside the envelope” when it comes to writing letters. Avoid the dreaded “How are you? I’m fine” opener. Wax lyrical on your favorite breakfast item. Write an ode to your cat. Compose an entire letter without once using the letter “E.” Make up fanfiction about your grade school music teacher who was, you were pretty sure, an undercover international spy.
And get personal. Handwritten letters are intimate. They’re a little piece of your soul, gift-wrapped for another human being. Think deep thoughts and ask hard questions. Let your letters expand you and your correspondee to encompass worlds of words.
One of the things I love best about this planner is that it says “hobo” on the spine, which pretty accurately sums up my lifestyle and aesthetic.
But seriously: the Techo is a fantastic planner and a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. Manufactured by the Japanese company Hobo Nikkan Toi Shinbun (translation: “Almost Everyday,” and Hobonichi for short), the Techo planner has been around since 2001, and its design is updated and refined every year. The first English version was made available in 2012.
My Techo shipped in this big, crinkly, yellow bag!
Here are the stats on my desk’s new best friend:
– Size: A6 (5.8″x 4.1″). Note: the Hobonichi A6 is NOT the same as some other notebooks labeled A6, such as the Rhodia A6 Webbie or the Leuchtturm. I am looking in to this discrepancy but from what I can tell, it’s likely that occidental and oriental standards differ. In any case, keep in mind actual dimensions if you want to purchase a cover for your Techo somewhere other than the Hobonichi website.
Uncovered Techo with my Delrin Render K. The front of the planner has the Japanese characters for “Te” and “cho” followed by the logo of ARTS&SCIENCE, the company that did art direction for this year’s Techo.
– Over 400 pages of bleed-resistant, tissue-thin, fountain-pen-friendly Tomoe River paper in a lay-flat binding. This planner is super flexible and springs right back into shape. The covers are black, leather-textured, and tough although they’re just coated card. (The Hobonichi is made to be put in a refillable cover — more on that in a later post.) The corners are rounded so as to minimize damage to an uncovered Techo.
– Includes yearly, monthly, and daily pages. The Hobonichi stores sells ribbon bookmarks for the Techo that include three different ribbons, which means you can always have the month marked as well as the day with the third ribbon reserved for the note section in the back.
– Immaculate printing in a deep charcoal with Sundays highlighted in red (really more a persimmon burnt-orange — a very smart, modern color combination, especially when paired with the pale sage end papers). The 4mm graph lines on the daily pages provide a guide without being obtrusive, making daily pages useful for sketching as well as taking notes. Same goes for the dot-grid pages in the back, which are printed in Sunday-orange. (I’m using a couple pages to keep track of Good Names For Bands, a list of books I want to read this year, and a stationery wish list, of course.)
– Each daily page shows the moon phase, international holidays, a mini-calendar so you can see at a glance exactly where you are in the month, and — really cool — a customizable time grid, which means that only noon is marked, set off by the number “12” halfway down the grid. At the very bottom is a little fork-and-knife symbol so you can schedule in dinner plans if you like. They also include daily quotes taken from articles on the Hobonichi website. My favorite so far is the one for Valentine’s Day:
“Boys! We don’t get you at all!
So don’t give us more of your sing-song.
Tell us what you really feel.
Your metaphors don’t work at all anymore.
Because we women are just too busy.”
– The Association to Sing Love Songs
You can read more about these features and see some really gorgeous photos at the Techo “features” page.
So how does this all stack up in terms of actual use? Well, I have a terrible track record with planners, possibly because I like collecting notebooks as much as using them and sticking to a single one for a year has been beyond my capacity thus far. But the Techo is useful on so many levels, and the layout of the single-day pages make them easily adapted to so many uses: to-do lists, journal entries, scrapbook (to an extent), sketchbook, in addition to whatever you’d normally put in a planner. One of my favorite new blogs is Hobonichi Love, where you can see photos submitted by users of the infinite artistic ways they’ve used their Techos!
Another thing that makes this planner so attractive is Hobonichi’s dedication to constantly improving their product. The 2015 edition introduced three new features: the dinner icon at the bottom of the daily time grid; a two-days-per-page section for the following year, so if next year’s Techo doesn’t arrive before January 1 you can keep recording and/or plan ahead; and next year’s calendar pages (of which there are three following December 2015) “watermarked” with a big, unmistakeable “2016” so you don’t mistake them for 2015’s calendar spreads.
And while I do have this terrible track record with planners, I’ve recently started a new job that makes it necessary to keep one. Not only do I use it to keep track of long-term projects and short-term tasks, but it’s also a record of professional development. It’s indispensable!
If you didn’t pick up a Techo in time to start in January, you can purchase the Hobonichi “Original” planner, which is only available in Japanese but whose daily pages run from March 1, 2015 to March 31, 2016.
The Techo will put you back by $35-$40 US dollars depending on exchange rates and customs. But it’s completely worth it in my opinion to have a dedicated page-a-day planner in a sleek, modern design that accommodates even the wettest fountain pen nib!
Hello, Pen-Friends, it’s good to be back from my regrettably long, unplanned hiatus! 2014 was a hard year, but 2015 is looking promising already. I’ve accepted a position as an administrative assistant in my department. What that means for this blog is that I’ll have even greater excuse need to invest in quality stationery products, pens, and other office supplies. Additionally, our tabletop gaming schedule is filling up, so I plan to include reviews of various products that prove invaluable to the success of our epic quests, including session sketches like I’ve done in the past.
Some products you can look forward to seeing reviewed on the Penventory in the coming months include the Delta Unica in Orange (limited to 100 pieces, exclusive to the Goulet Pen Co.), the now-discontinued TWSBI Micarta, the Hobonichi Techo planner for 2015, and the Roterfaden Taschenbegleiter, among many others. There might even be a guest post or two and reviews of some relevant books! Additionally, I will continue to add items to my Tomoe River Paper Master Post, which continues to be a popular resource.
What are your resolutions for 2015? Did you get any awesome pens for Christmas? What are you looking forward to trying out this year? Is there anything you want more or less of from the Penventory? Hit me up in the comments!
Shannon Chamberlain published an interesting article yesterday at The Atlantic about business correspondence manuals in the 18th century and how they helped people to improve and refine their communication. It’s an interesting article, especially some of her thoughts toward the end about how the correspondence manual might be a helpful tool even today:
Even as we learn that young people do more writing these days than ever, we bemoan their lack of basic communication skills, the influence of texting on their orthography, and the fact that they talk like Internet cats to their potential employers.
The banal familiarity of the handwringing about the younger generation’s foibles doesn’t quite dull the shock of getting an email addressed “heyyyyy profesor” or punctuated with “dude” in lieu of commas or periods (I am not a dude). But there are other, subtler ways in which the world of the 18th-century correspondence manual resonates with our current context, ones that suggest that a revival of the letter-writing manual might be in order.
She also writes that in 1751, the Earl of Chesterfield offered some advice to his son Philip on the topic of his business correspondence: “In business, an elegant simplicity, the result of care, not of labor, is required.” Good advice even today for those of us whose occupation involves correspondence, whether it’s email or even text message. At its heart, this is why I prefer the carefully-written text message to emails or telephone calls when coordinating or exchanging quick bits of information: the nature of the text message is brevity above all, inclining one to dispense with the very American tendency to pad communication with small-talk and other filler.
Check out the article, and let me know your thoughts. Do you think there’s a use for correspondence manuals in today’s realm of business communication? Do you bemoan the influence of text messaging, or do you think there’s something redeemable there?
The first fountain pen I bought was a navy blue Kaweco Sport Chess, which, with its EF nib, instantly became my favorite go-to pen. I loved it so much that when I lost the body of the pen, I bought a replacement immediately. I still love it so much that when I saw that the Goulet Pen Co. had put its AL Sports on close-out sale, I jumped out of bed, bleary-eyed at 5am, to place an order before they sold out. Fifteen minutes later I was back in bed and looking forward to the arrival of this beauty.
And a beauty it is. Its dimensions are the same as the classic Sport, but it’s a touch heavier and its furnishings are chrome-plated rather than the admittedly garish faux gold of the classic model. Like the rest of the Sports, it comes without a clip to keep the cost down. Clips are available for $3 to $4 depending on where you shop; if you check EBay, you might even find the new “N” clip — “N” for “nostalgia,” apparently. For the record: the design of this pen dates back to the original Sport that was first manufactured in the ’30s.
And now that it’s made out of aluminum, one of these pens might last you another 90+ years (though the anodized finish will eventually scuff and scratch if you use it well). Far from being slick and cold and impersonal, the aluminum body has a matte finish that gives it a friendly, rough feel, and it quickly warms to your hand. I didn’t expect that, nor the sense of solidness and security that the weight imparts.
I also didn’t expect to be disappointed — for a second time – by the M nib. It, like the nib on my Student, has a very narrow sweet spot, and if you don’t hold it at exactly the right angle, it skips at nearly every opening stroke. (In the writing sample for this post, I went back and touched up skips, unlike that of my Student review.) What I thought to excuse as an anomaly in my Student seems more like an inherent quality to Kaweco’s M nib. Now, I deliberately avoided the B and BB nibs because I’ve heard they cause problems, but I thought I’d dodge that bullet with the M. Apparently not.
So it looks like I’ll be shopping out my AL Sport to a nibmeister before I can start singing its praises. It’s a real shame and a big disappointment because I’ve been looking forward to owning an AL Sport for a while. I’m just glad I didn’t pay full price for it. But you know what? As much of a bummer this M nib is, it’s incredibly easy to swap out nibs on the Sports, so if I’m too lazy (and/or broke) to get it to a nibmeister, I can perform a pretty quick fix for $10.50 at JetPens.
Azizah over at Gourmet Pens recently did a review of Ben Rowley’s paper, and it was thanks to her post that I managed to put in an order and take advantage of his stylus + nib giveaway! Thanks for the hot tip, Azizah. Y’all should check out her review; she goes into excellent detail about the construction of the pads, so I’ll skim over that here.
I’ve been writing a lot about paper recently, but almost exclusively about Tomoe River paper, so my interest was piqued when I saw Azizah’s review of this product. I have a handful of dip pen nibs that I use for playing with new inks, including some sketching nibs which I’ve found to be virtually unusable due to their scratchiness. Ben Rowley’s paper is advertised as “the perfect paper for both smooth nibs and sharp nibs,” and his prices were so reasonable I had to pick up a couple of pads.
The ordering process is so rudimentary it kind of feels like a back alley exchange, in the best way possible: I emailed Ben with my request, he emailed me a PayPal receipt, I paid, and in two or three days the box was at my door. And what did I get? A bound pad of 100 sheets of “standard descender” ruled paper, 8.5″x5.5″, and 100 loose-leaf blank sheets, same size. And a hand-written thank-you note from Ben! That was a nice touch.
This paper is narrower than the Tomoe River correspondence sheets sold by Paper For Fountain Pens, just the right size for a standard A5 envelope, so you don’t have to fold in the sides at all. It’s definitely heavier than TR paper, but most paper is. One side of the paper has a slightly rougher texture, whereas the other side is smooth. I’m not sure which is supposed to be the “front” of the sheet, but I prefer the smooth side for fountain pen usage; the rough side is nice for pencil work.
Ben kindly enclosed a wooden stylus and three Esterbrook dip-pen nibs, which I enjoyed testing on his paper. I’ve used sketching nibs before and was always frustrated by their scratchiness, which was often so extreme that they were unusable on most paper. This paper, however, cooperates beautifully with scratchy nibs. (I will include photos and a review of the nibs and stylus in a separate post.)
For me one of the signs of its effectiveness was the way that ink blobs didn’t feather into the paper, but rather rested on the surface. This indicates that the nib did not break the paper’s fibers, which is the main cause of feathering and makes a scratchy nib practically unusable. (Please note that the blobbing is a result of my ineptitude with a particular nib and NOT with the paper itself!)
I tested all my currently inked fountain pens on an unlined sheet and was very pleased with the results. The only feathering I noticed was with the Pilot Desk Pen, but I think it might have been partly the fault of the ink, De Atramentis’ Johann Sebastian Bach, and the fact that the pen was running a bit dry due to not being used in a while. And I had to peer very close to see the feathering.
I was disappointed that very little sheen showed up in the Iroshizuku Momiji sample on this paper. There may be something about the texture that counteracts the sheen somehow. However, the paper is thick and sturdy, so the back of the flex pen sample looks drastically different from such a sample on TR paper:
Much less of an impression left than with the TR paper! Here’s the back of the sheet below. You’ll notice that the only bleeding was with the Sharpie and the Bic marker, and there’s very faint ghosting otherwise.
And the full front:
If you want to try some of this magnificent paper, drop Ben a line. His pricing is as follows:
When I ordered this paper, I thought I’d be using the standard descender pad a lot for script practice, but so far I’ve gone through quite a bit of the blank sheets in my correspondence. It’s fantastic letter paper! I usually decorate the first page with a stamp of some kind — my letterhead, or some sort of illustration — and there’s no prettier stationery you can get at that price. Like I said above, it fits perfectly into an A5 envelope, and while Ben doesn’t sell envelopes, you could purchase a block of loose-leaf 8.5″x11″ paper and make your own, or go with some simple A5 kraft paper envelopes, which complement the paper beautifully.
Tomoe River paper is my favorite fountain pen paper — at 52gsm it is feather-light, thin as onion skin, yet still impervious to feathering and bleeding, and it performs beautifully with many different kinds of ink. It is silky-smooth but not glassy and it is perfect for writing long letters, testing ink, writing lists, practicing calligraphy, and journalling upon. Yet owing to the difficulty in obtaining the raw material of the paper itself — which is sold exclusively by the Tomoegawa company in Japan — finding this wonder-paper in the perfect format can be difficult if not downright impossible.
Thus I have assembled this master list of Tomoe River paper resources as well as identified some specific stationery needs in the hopes that someone out there will finally create a cloth-cover A5 thread-bound journal with white TR paper printed with an unobtrusive 5- or 6mm dot grid! (Ahem.)
Disclaimers: I do not make any claims to comprehensiveness, but if you know of a format I haven’t listed, please let me know and I’ll add it. I do not list prices here, as they can fluctuate too frequently to keep track of; however, availability also fluctuates, links break, etc. Also, I haven’t personally used every product on this list (…yet), but I have tried to provide links to reviews when I can.
LETTER SHEETS
Tomoe River Paper Sample (x3 sheets, available at NanamiPaper and JetPens in white and cream)
Never tried Tomoe River paper before? Add a sample on to your next JetPens order and see what the fuss is about.
For a limited time, you can also get a sample for free from JustWrite with any order!
Top-bound “correspondence size” pad with glue binding
A5 White (from PaperForFountainPens and NanamiPaper)
A5 Cream (from PaperForFountainPens and NanamiPaper)
Approximately A5-sized sheets, perfect for writing letters. I ordered mine from Paper For Fountain Pens and they arrived speedily and with a lovely hand-written note. No envelopes as of yet made out of Tomoe River paper, but NanamiPaper has envelopes that are the perfect size and a close match to the cream shade. Review here forthcoming!
A4 7mm Lined (from OwlStationers)
Same as above, but 8.5”x11”.
Loose Leaf Sheets in White
A5 (from JustWrite)
A4 (from JustWrite, JetPens, JetPens in CREAM)
A4, 7mm Lined (from OwlStationers)
In case you’d rather not bother with glue binding.
JOURNALS
The Seven Seas “Writer” (at the Nanami Paper Co)
Soft-back, 480 pages, 7mm lines, lay-flat, thread bound, super flexible, standard size so it can be used as a refill for lots of refillable journals. I sing its praises in a review here.
The Paper For Fountain Pens Blank Book
White
Cream
Hardbound, unlined, 320 pages, pages approx. 5”x8”. Nice review over at the Pen Habit.
Design.Y Handcrafted Leather-bound Journals
Located in Sendai City, Japan, the folks at Design.Y have several luxury journals available for purchase with Tomoe River paper: Model 216, Model 288, Model 336, and LP Record
JustWrite + Olive and the Volcano Letterpress Journals
Approx. A6, Blank, 120 pages
Approx. A5, Blank, 120 Pages
Covers are black letterpressed cardstock. I’m planning on getting a pair of these as soon as they’re back in stock, because you can literally never have too much Tomoe River paper. The Pentorium did a great review of these!
OTHER
The Hobonichi Planner – 2015
I read a blog post on this planner when I started my fountain pen journey. Yet it wasn’t until December 2014 that I ordered a copy for myself. The Hobonichi Planner has almost a cult following in Japan and there are many “extras” available for it, from covers to bookmark charms. You can read my review of the planner here. If you’re concerned about the usability of a planner whose pages ghost so much, please see this post of mine for images of writing on both sides of TR paper.
Hobonichi Memo Books
Set of 3 memo notebooks with 3.7mm graph paper and perforated sheets designed to fit in the back pocket of the A6 Hobonichi planner. (Thanks to Chase for bringing this to my attention.)
Backpocket Journals
Curnow Book and Leather sells these Field-Notes-sized journals in a three-pack for $12.50. Link leads to the Facebook page. To order, message them with what you want and your shipping info.
Reviews at Fountain Pen Geeks and Modern Stationer.
OwlStationers Notebooks
Passport Size: set of three, approx 3.45” x 4.88”, 80 unlined cream pages
Travelers Size: set of two, 80 unlined cream pages, kraft paper cover
Pocket Notebook: set of three, 3.5”x5.5”, 80 unlined cream pages, kraft paper cover
Ramay Davinci Binder System
Personal/Bible Size in black, brown, and wine leather
Pocket Size in black, brown, and wine leather
This binder system contains monthly and weekly calendars, lined pages, and checklists all printed on Tomoe River paper. Note that address pages are printed on Yupo synthetic paper so they are water- and stain-resistant (and probably incompatible with a lot of fountain pen inks). JetPens has a wide variety of refills available at prices from $2.90 to $4.60 per pack.
Stateside Co. Notebooks
Link to Kickstarter page. A totally customizable notebook with a cover made of French Paper Co. paper in lunch bag brown or dark grey, die-cut with the shape of whatever state (or country!) you choose. During the ordering process, you pick a color, a size, the state you want die-cut on the front, the kind of paper inside (blank, grid, dot-grid, or lined), and an inscription for the sleeve. A dream come true? Almost, were it not for the fact that apparently the backers’ rewards have been delayed due to a fire that destroyed all the TR paper. TRAGIC. Still, I’m definitely keeping an eye on these guys and I’ll update as soon as I hear more. (Thanks to the Modern Stationer for the tip.)
NEEDS
~ The biggest Tomoe River void to be filled is that of alternate rulings. Almost all available formats of the paper are blank, with the exception of a very few in a 7mm ruling. Many of us prefer a narrower line for our small handwriting – a 6mm or even 5.5mm would be amazing. (Imho, the only thing keeping the Seven Seas “Writer” from being the perfect journal is its wide rule.)
~ Similarly, TR paper in graph or dot-grid is apparently nonexistent. Personally, I’d leap tall buildings in a single bound and spend copious amounts of money on such a product. Currently you can find a few small pocket-notebooks on the Hobonichi website, if you must satisfy a craving for dot-grid TR paper!
~ More TR paper pocket notebooks! I adore my Field Notes, but anybody who makes a 6mm ruled, graph, or dot-grid TR pocket book is almost certainly going to unhorse good ol’ Field Notes from my NockCo Hightower. (Except the Colors editions. I am a die-hard subscriber.)
~ Different covers would be excellent. Currently, there are luxury leather bindings or the cheapest paper covers with very little in between. The Hobonichi planners, however, are insertable into a wide variety of beautiful covers made expressly for that purpose.
Thanks for reading. Let me know of any additions/corrections that need to be made!
A professional recording studio in Columbia, MO where you can relax and make it sound the way it does in your head.
digitally writing analog thoughts
“… but we will trust in the name of the Lord our God.” Psalm 20:7
The best place to find beautiful stationery
Postage stamps are pop culture
Life / Photography / Work Portfolio
These things happen
The blog of a bad survivor
I'm back in Moscow - again. I'm ready for great time with old friends and many months of more Russian adventures.
musings on the hand-written life
Website of Dr. Tim LeCroy
a topography of dysfunctional grey matter
Fitness, Food, and Family
Welcome. Let me pour you a cup...
Where we all can come together
Our bricks & mortar shop is at 250 Carlaw Ave, Unit 105 in Toronto, Canada - shop online at wonderpens.ca
For the love of pencils
A young man's journey into the world of fountain pens and calligraphy
THE PENVENTORY 