Pencil Review: The (Palomino) Blackwing 602

A year after the relaunch of the Blackwing, CalCedar found themselves in the position of having to choose between forging ahead with their new vision for the brand, reflected in the “non-traditional” design of the first Palomino Blackwing pencil, and appeasing the Blackwing purists, who were clamoring for a more “authentic” pencil in line with the vintage Eberhard Faber original.

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The result was the Palomino Blackwing 602, which catered to both constituencies by incorporating new design elements while maintaining a “vintage” look. Most notably, the new pencil featured a pearlescent gunmetal lacquer similar to later iterations of the vintage Blackwing, and also reintroduced the classic slogan “Half the Pressure, Twice the Speed,” on the barrel. While some find the tagline nonsensical (and apparently there was some internal debate over whether to revive it at all), it may have its origins with stenographers, who appreciated the pencil for its ability to make dark, legible notations while still maintaining a decent wear rate. CalCedar tweaked the original design somewhat, using a black eraser instead of pink, and omitting the black stripe from the ferrule.  

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Blackwing 602 with the black eraser swapped out in favor of classic pink. And, no, I don't chew my pencils. The "teethmarks" are from the excellent Carl Angel-5 sharpener (also marketed as the Classroom Friendly Sharpener). 

Just recently, Blackwing again changed the design of the 602 to bring it even closer to the original vintage pencil, switching the default eraser color from black to pink. Previously, the only way you could get a Blackwing 602 with the “vintage pink” eraser was by purchasing a pack yourself (sold separately) and swapping them out, or by purchasing the Chuck Jones special edition Blackwing 602 (now discontinued).  

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The Blackwing 530, one of the limited Blackwing "Volumes", included a black stripe on the ferrule - a design element that appeared on some, but not all, vintage Blackwings. I love the look of the ferrule stripe. 

In addition to different aesthetics, the Blackwing 602 uses a firmer core of Japanese graphite, designed to maximize point retention while at the same time sacrificing as little smoothness and darkness as possible. Personally, I think CalCedar succeeded. The 602 doesn’t have Caran d’Ache Swiss Wood-style point retention (and that pencil is borderline too hard for me), but two Blackwing 602s, freshly sharpened to a long point, will get me through an hour-long meeting at work with heavy notetaking. Someone who writes with a lighter hand than I do might squeeze out even more mileage.

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While I love the original Palomino Blackwing, if I had to stock a classroom or an office supply closet with the best Blackwing for most people - I can dream, right? - my choice would be the 602. The Blackwing 602’s combination of point retention, darkness, and looks makes it an excellent choice for everyday work situations, such as when I’m going into a meeting and won’t have access to a sharpener.

Takeaways and Where to Buy

As I mentioned in last week’s review, the original Blackwing pencil remains my favorite simply because it’s somewhat unique to find a pencil that makes such a dark line while remaining usable for writing for any length of time. The Blackwing 602, however, runs a close second, and sees a lot of use at my desk.

As with the original, Blackwing regularly features the 602 core in the Blackwing Volumes special edition pencils, including Volumes 211 (John Muir); 344 (Dorothea Lange); 205 (Jade); 56 (Joe DiMaggio).

As of 2024, The Gentleman Stationer is now an authorized retailer of Blackwing, so you can purchase directly from us and show your support!

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I own two of the Blackwing Volumes editions that featured the 602 core: the Blackwing 211 (John Muir) and the Blackwing 344 (Dorothea Lange). The Blackwing 344 features the most recent logo and branding. 

This review is the second installment of an anticipated multipart review of the various Blackwing pencils on the market today. You can check out Part I - my review of the original Palomino Blackwing with some background on the revival of the brand - here, as well as my earlier review of the Blackwing line of notebooks.

Disclaimer: I purchased the pencils featured in this review with my own funds, for my own use. This post contains affiliate links.

Pencil Review: The Original (Palomino) Blackwing

Few stationery items have drawn more attention - and fueled more late-night internet bickering - than the Eberhard Faber Blackwing 602. In recent years, the Blackwing “legend” has taken on a life of its own in popular culture, due to a combination of (1) the scarcity of the original vintage pencil; (2) the mythology surrounding the pencil and those who used it, fueled by internet stationery obsessives - seriously, who are these people!?; and (3) the 2010 release, to much success and acclaim, of a highly regarded series of pencils in the style of the original Blackwing by CalCedar, a California-based pencil manufacturer that purchased the Blackwing trademark once it expired.  

The original Eberhard Faber Blackwing dates to the 1930s, and became a favorite pencil of various writers and artists such as Stephen Sondheim, Chuck Jones, John Steinbeck, and others. From the time of its discontinuation in the late 1990s to the re-release, enthusiasts were known to hoard boxes/grosses of the original pencil, paying hundreds of dollars for a dozen. Vintage Blackwings continue to sell for ridiculous premiums. Personally, I’ve never owned a vintage Blackwing 602, and regardless of how cool it would be to have one, even I can’t bring myself to shell out $50 for a single pencil. I’m primarily a user, not a collector, and that $50 will buy more than two dozen “modern Blackwings” that perform (for my purposes) just as well. You can read further on the history of the Blackwing pencil here. The 2010 relaunch was covered by media outlets such as the New Yorker and BoingBoing, and wasn’t without controversy.

Three Blackwings, Three Different Pencils

This review takes a look at one of the three “new” Blackwings, namely the original pencil that was released in 2010. Blackwing currently makes three versions as part of its standard lineup, each featuring a different graphite core. The original features extremely dark “soft” graphite, and is marketed towards artists. The Blackwing 602 - designed to more closely resemble the original vintage pencil, including the "Half The Pressure, Twice the Speed" slogan - features a firmer core supposedly geared towards writers, and the Blackwing Pearl is a white pencil with “balanced” graphite that sits between the other two on the hardness scale. (Note: Blackwing does not assign a “grade” to its pencils, such as “No. 2,” “No. 1”, “HB”, etc. I have found all Blackwing pencils, with the exception of the “extra firm” core released in certain special editions, to be softer than a standard HB/No.2.)  

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As someone who’s primarily a writer - not an artist - why is the original my favorite of the three standard Blackwing cores? Because for whatever reason, despite the soft graphite, this pencil writes well and maintains a writeable point longer than the “harder” Blackwing 602 or the Pearl, which get pushed as the pencils “for writers.” Here’s what I mean by maintaining a “writeable point”: while the Blackwing won’t keep a super-sharp, KUM-Masterpiece-style point forever, you’re able to write with it longer both because of the darkness of the core and because with such soft graphite, you can fairly easily “sharpen” the point yourself by rotating the pencil as you write. Your personal mileage may vary, but I also experience very little smearing with this pencil - rare for graphite this dark.  

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Note the improvements to the imprint from the 2010 original (top) to the present-day imprints from two Blackwing Volumes editions (bottom). 

My Blackwing pencils shipped as part of the original manufacturing run, and are seven years old! Therefore, they look a lot different than the pencils Blackwing sells today. For one thing,  as Blackwing has consolidated as it’s own brand under the CalCedar umbrella, the "Palomino" branding has changed, the pencil no longer has a gold stripe below the ferrule, and now sports a black eraser. The finish on the modern pencils has also improved. The standard Blackwing still features the matte black coating with gold imprint, but the original run had an issue with gold flecks spilling outside the lines a bit. While the core hasn’t changed, once I kill this box (less one pencil for posterity) it will be exciting to pick up a new batch and compare.  

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Blackwing's distinctive ferrule and square eraser. 

A note on manufacturing and sourcing: While the modern Blackwing pencils are manufactured by CalCedar, an American Company, they aren’t entirely a “made-in-the-USA” pencil. CalCedar (sustainably) sources its pencil slats from California and Oregon,  and the graphite in the Blackwing pencils comes from Japan. This isn’t a knock against Blackwing - the graphite cores used in Japanese pencils are among the best in the world. CalCedar is one of the largest suppliers of pencil slats to the global pencil industry, so what you have is a quality pencil, made using the best available components, by people who know what they are doing. If you’re interested in learning more about the background of CalCedar and the development of the modern Blackwing pencils, I highly recommend that you listen to Episode 79 of the Erasable Podcast, The Pencil Man Cometh, featuring Charles Berolzheimer of CalCedar.   

Takeaways and Where to Buy

The original Blackwing is currently is my “go-to” woodcase pencil. I keep three or four of them sharpened at all times on my desk at work. They aren’t inexpensive (roughly $20 per dozen, and they hardly ever go on sale), but unless you’re one of those people who churn through a dozen pencils in a week, you should get a lot of mileage out of that $20.  

Blackwing original (center) with the Blackwing Volume 1138 (top) and Volume 73 (bottom).

If the matte-black finish or gold trim doesn’t do it for you, Blackwing periodically features the “soft” core in its limited-edition “Blackwing Volumes” pencils. The recent Volume 73, with a blue “Lake Tahoe” theme, is still available as of the time of publication from both Blackwing and retailers who still have the pencil in stock. In the coming weeks I’ll be offering my thoughts on the other Blackwing pencils. In the meantime, you can check out my previous review of the Blackwing line of notebooks.

As of 2024, The Gentleman Stationer is now an authorized retailer of Blackwing, so you can purchase directly from us and show your support!

Pencil Review: The Baron Fig Archer "Prismatic" Edition

It's that time again! For what's become an at-least-monthly event:  The release of a new limited edition from Baron Fig. The last version of Baron Fig's Archer pencil, the "Snakes & Ladders" edition, drew some criticism because Baron Fig changed the graphite formula to a softer, 2B-ish core. While I enjoy soft pencils, and really liked the look of the Snakes & Ladders, Baron Fig returned to their firmer, standard Archer core for the next limited edition pencil, the Prismatic. 

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The three Archers, from left: Prismatic, Snakes & Ladders, and the standard pencil. 

“Prisms come in myriad shapes and break up light into a beautiful spectrum of colors. Ideas can be viewed in the same light (pun intended) - they come in all shapes, sizes, and colors. Prismatic - what will you think up?”

— Baron Fig

Each pack of Prismatic Archer pencils includes four red, yellow, and blue pencils, each with a dipped purple end cap. I like the look of these pencils, and somewhat surprisingly, the red and the blue pencils are my favorite. When I first received the promotional photographs, I expected to love the yellows, but the finish on my yellow pencils is thin and shows cracking and flaking on one or two of them. I'm not going to knock Baron Fig too hard for this. When you're producing a large volume of woodcase pencils - a consumable good that's sold in packs of a dozen and meant to be used up - its not going to receive the same level of individual quality control that say, a $60 Squire pen might receive. I've had cracked finishes in $22 boxes of Blackwings. That said, this isn't a $4 per dozen box of pencils, so it's still a bit annoying.

Some of the finish on my yellow Prismatics is a bit thin and bubbly, to the point where you can almost see the underlying wood. 

Writing Experience

The standard Archer has been in regular use since it was first released back in October.  I keep a couple sharpened at my desk and others tucked into various books that I'm reading. If you're a fan of graphite cores just slightly on the harder side of HB, then the Archer should be on your radar, especially if you like to write on toothier paper like Baron Fig which can wear down softer pencils fairly quickly. The standard Archer core is surprisingly dark for how good the point retention is. Baron Fig's pencils remind me of "European HB" pencils like the Staedtler Noris or Staedtler Tradition. That's probably not a coincidence - the Archers are manufactured in Portugal.

Before I received my first pack of Archers, I wasn't a fan eraserless pencils. I thought that I needed the eraser in order for the pencil to balance better in my hand. As it turns out, this isn't the case, and I've come to enjoy writing with the lighter "end-dipped" pencil. In the U.S., end-dipped pencils are somewhat harder to find than they are in Europe or Japan, at least outside of the "art pencil" market.  

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Where to Buy

You can purchase the standard Archer, the Prismatics, and even Snakes and Ladders directly from Baron Fig's online store. Limited edition versions of all of Baron Fig's products, including the Archer, the Squire, the Confidant, and the Vanguard, are released on a quarterly basis. 

Disclaimer: Baron Fig sent me these pencils free of charge for review purposes. I was not otherwise compensated for this review. 

Some Kickstarter Inspiration: Sostanza Clutch Pencil

I've laid off the pen Kickstarters recently. Last year, the Tactile Turn Gist and the Namisu Nova really were the only two that piqued my interest in any way. A lot of projects now tend to involve designs that either aren't original enough to justify spending $50-100, or "tactical pens" that double as a weapon, which I don't have any use for. 

Long story short, I haven't been monitoring Kickstarter as closely as I should have, and I would've missed the Sostanza clutch pencil entirely had the folks at Sotteranea Officina Sperimentale, a design studio located in Torino, Italy, not reached out and asked if I wanted to review their new project. 

Design Overview

The Sostanza is a clutch pencil/leadholder. Part of its appeal lies in its simplicity: the pencil consists of only three pieces: the wooden body, the 2mm lead, and a silver ring that fits around the body of the pencil and acts as a clamp that keeps the lead from sliding out the front. It's not quite as simple in its design as the Penxo leadholder, but it's much easier to operate and won't rip your fingernails off when you try to release the lead.

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The clutch mechanism on the Sostanza is simple: a split piece of wood held closed by a silver ring.

The pencil comes in various wood grains, including pear, mahogany, black walnut, ebony, and amaranth. (Note that ebony and amaranth are more expensive, being more exotic woods). I opted for the mahogany version. It's beautiful and smells great. All woods are said to have been sustainably harvested. The metal ring is made from sterling silver, but is cast in different tones to match the wood. 

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The Sostanza tucked inside my Write Notepads Kindred Spirit Edition (which I would advise you to get while supplies last). 

What I find interesting about this product is that the creators of the Sostanza appear to be trying to break the assumptions people have about clutch pencils and leadholders: people seem to assume that they are strictly artists' tools that are used for drawing. Instead, the creators of Sostanza have been very careful to refer to the Sostanza as a "wooden pencil that never ends," which to me strongly implies that this pencil is intended to be used as much for writing as it is for design work.  

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Sostanza is very light and well-balanced. 

Sostanza works well as a writing tool. One thing that makes many leadholders unsuitable for long-form writing is their weight: they can be heavy and cause your hand to cramp. That's not an issue here. The Sostanza is extremely light, to the point where I can even comfortably tuck it behind my ear like a standard woodcase pencil. The pencil is also very well balanced, and feels similar to a fat "jumbo-style" woodcase pencil in the hand. Initially, I worried that the metal ring might make for an uncomfortable grip, but I've not had any issues based on how I hold the pencil. 

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I found the Sostanza very comfortable to hold, with the silver ring causing me no issues. 

Pricing/Value

The Kickstarter price for the Sostanza was 25 euros for the Early Bird, 30 euros for the regular reward, and 35 euros for the "deluxe packaging," which is a glass test tube with a cork stopper. I'd stick with the standard packaging: the test tube is cool, but the cork really can't be used as a stand for the Sostanza, as the pictures on Kickstarter imply. Mine kept falling over. While not inexpensive - there are cheaper leadholders and clutch pencils out there - the Sostanza is a unique-looking piece that tries to bring something new to the table.

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The Sostanza in its deluxe "test tube" packaging. Shipping from Italy was very fast. The Sostanza made it to me in about a week.

Takeaways

I enjoy clutch pencils, and it's nice to find one that seems like it was made for writers as much as artists and designers. The Sostanza is beautiful and, in my opinion, worth the price. It's made it's way onto my desk at work and I've been using it regularly since it arrived.

The one drawback to the Sostanza is that it's definitely a "desk tool" for me: there's no clip, so it can't easily be transported around, and it's a touch long to fit comfortably in a pen case.  Plus it's thin: I don't think Sostanza would survive having much pressure applied to it in the event something accidentally got dropped on my Nock Co. Sinclair, which is where I've been storing the pencil during my review.  

If the idea of a leadholder intrigues you, but you either can't wait for the Sostanza to hit the open market, or you'd prefer more of a traditional mechanical-pencil design (including a clip), I'd recommend that you try the Caran d'Ache Fixpencil.   

Where to Buy

The Sostanza Kickstarter successfully raised over $12,000, so hopefully we will see this project on the market after the rewards are fulfilled. You can preorder the Sostanza here. Please note that the Sostanza does not ship with either extra 2mm leads or a lead pointer (i.e., a sharpener). I'd recommend Uni 2B Leads and Lead Pointer.    

Further Reading

The Sostanza has been reviewed favorably elsewhere. Ian over a Pens!Paper!Pencils! wrote a nice review, and is also giving a Sostanza away. Mike Dudek at the Clicky Post also has a review up, which, as always, is excellent.    

Disclaimer: Sotteranea Officina Sperimentale sent me this Sostanza free of charge for review purposes. This post may also contain affiliate links to third parties.

New Product Alert: Sprout Pencils

I don't typically review things that could be considered novelty products, but when Sprout reached out to me and asked if I would like to review their "plantable pencils," the idea intrigued me.  The Sprout pencil is unique because on the end of the pencil, instead of an eraser, sits a capsule containing either vegetable, herb, or flower seeds.  The idea is when the unfinished, FSC-certified cedar pencil is too short to use comfortably, you can stick the capsule end of the pencil into the ground and add water.  The capsule will dissolve, the seeds will sprout, and the pencil stub works as a garden marker.  

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Sprout plantable pencils come in packages of three and eight.  You can also buy themed sets containing flowers, herbs, etc. 

Sprout sent me two three-packs of what appear to be standard #2/HB writing pencils, though the graphite isn't graded.  One three pack contained organic thyme, organic basil, and organic cherry tomato, while the other contained green pepper, coriander, and marigold.  For the record, I sharpened up organic cherry tomato and organic basil, since those are the two I'm most eager to use up and plant, though my goal is to get all of them in the ground by May.   

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The Sprout pencil reminds me a lot of the Field Notes pencil.  I prefer a darker core for regular writing, but I have my Sprout pencils tucked away in various books I'm reading.  They get used!

I'd characterize the writing experience as decent.  The unfinished pencil is comfortable to hold (think a less splintery version of the "Field Notes pencil"), and Sprout actually etches the name of the plants onto the pencils using what looks to be a woodburning kit.  (Remember those? Just sniff the writing, it smells great, like a fire pit.)  The graphite, however, is a touch scratchy (again, like the Field Notes pencil) and a tad too light for my taste, but far from unusable.      

These make a cool gift for the stationery nerd you know who's also a gardener.  You can buy Sprout pencils directly via their website (link here), along with a variety of other garden-themed stationery products.  

DISCLAIMER:  Sprout provided me with these products free of charge for review purposes.