Thursday Drops: TWSBI Sunset Yellow, Anderillium Inks, Perforated Paper, Washi Tape, and More

Happy TWSBI Pre-Order Day! The TWSBI Diamond ALR “Sunset Yellow” is now available for pre-order! Hopefully they will be in stock and ready to ship early next week. We’ve also restocked on much of our paper over the past few weeks, in anticipation of summer ending and everyone heading back to school and back to work! Brands that are fully stocked include Clairefontaine, Stalogy, Midori, Lochby, and other favorites. Finally, I figured I would go ahead and post a group shot of remaining Hinze Pens to give you all a sense of what materials are still available for purchase. If you see a specific pen you are interested in, or a predominant color, send me a message to let me know after you place your order. All pens ship with a bottle of the limited edition “Summer Sangria” ink and a red or black nib.

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Some stock I have remaining: check out the variation in the material. The pens on the left have tighter swirls of color, the ones in the middle and to the right progressively have larger amounts of single colors (typically either the burgundy/maroon or grey).

DC Pen Show Pickup Options for Next Week - What’s Available to Travel

Next week we will be at the D.C. Pen Show and sharing some limited table space with our friends at Vanness Pens. While I will have a few items available for sale on site, including what if anything is left of the Hinze Pen Collaboration, I am happy to bring any items to the show for delivery. Please be aware that extremely heavy orders (i.e., multiple thick notebooks) may not be possible, but most pens and inks, as well as reasonable paper orders, will be fine. If you’d like to place an order for DC delivery, simply select “local pickup” at checkout and message me to let me know which day you plan to pick up at the show (Friday, Saturday, or Sunday). I hope to see as many of you as possible there!

The Gentleman Stationer is an authorized retailer of all brands sold.

1. TWSBI Diamond 580 ALR “Sunset Yellow” (Pre-Order). If TWSBI were looking to solidify their status as one of my favorite all-around brands, they certainly did themselves a big favor with this last release. Whoa. I’ve found the recent string of yellow and orange pens stunning. We’ve placed our shop order and the pens should arrive early next week.

2. Clairefontaine Triomphe Notebooks. Triomphe writing pads and writing paper is one of the best-selling products that we stock, and now Clairefontaine has made the paper available in notebook form! Triomphe A5 softcover notebooks are available in lined or blank formats, with white or ivory paper - both equally fountain pen friendly.

3. Perforated Paper from Clairefontaine! I may need to revisit at least one of my #21penquestions responses: If there’s a product I wish existed, it would be more notebooks with perforated pages. This week we added to the shop “Pupitre” bound tablets, “Forever” recycled notebooks (which are still fountain pen friendly), and My.Essentials A5 Journals (which have a small number of perforated pages at the back.

4. Maruman Mnemosyne Notebooks and Notepads. Speaking of perforations, the Maruman Mnemosyne pads and notebooks also feature perforated paper.

5. Lochby Covers and Cases. One brand that I will be bringing with me to the D.C. Pen Show is Lochby, and we recently restocked on all colors of the Field Journal, Quattro four-pen cases, and Venture Pouch!

6. Midori Kurashiki Canvas Pen and Pencil Pouches. Going through my stock as I prepare for D.C., it turns out that I have a few more of these in-stock that I had forgotten to re-enter following the Arkansas Show in the Spring. Both flat and gusseted cases are still available!

7. Anderillium Ink Restock! All of the Cephalopod and Avian series inks are back in stock, including favorites American Goldfinch Yellow, Green Kingfisher Green, and more.

8. New iLootPaperie Washi Tape! In addition to restocking favorites, we have some new washi tapes that arrived this week, including some new wide-format Snail-mail washi and “dark” envelopes!

9. Stalogy Notebooks/Planners. We have the full selection of A5 Stalogy Planners/notebooks in both dot grid and graph rulings, including limited edition covers from the past two years! Stalogy notebooks come in 1/2 year or 365-day sizes, and are designed to serve as a day-to-a-page notebook but are undated so the layout is quite flexible.

10. Stalogy Removable Calendar Stickers. These stickers allow you to add a calendar to any page of any notebook, and are removable so you can move them around. Midori makes a similar product.

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Triomphe Paper, in notebook form!

Paper Review: Clairefontaine Is My Personal Benchmark for Fountain Pen Friendly Paper

Everyone has a personal benchmark, or reference point by which they measure most things, whether it’s pens, inks, paper, or something else entirely. For me, whenever I’m evaluating any sort of paper, my comparison starts with Clairefontaine.

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In an era where new specialty paper brands hit the market on a seemingly weekly basis - each touted as having “special properties” or “even more ink friendliness than ___” - it’s easy to overlook the basics. Brands such as Clairefontaine and Rhodia (which come from the same family of companies but have slightly different paper formulations) have been churning out excellent all-around paper for a very long time, and if what you’re looking for is quality, relatively cost-effective paper that’s easy to find and capable of handling most pens and inks, I often suggest that new users start here. Specifically, the reasons I love/recommend this paper include:

• Versatility. Clairefontaine Paper comes in a wide range of formats and rulings. Honestly, the idea for this post struck me yesterday morning as I was unpacking a recent shop order and found myself floored by the variety of products that kept emerging from the box. Clairefontaine makes pocket notebooks, reporter-style notebooks, A5 notebooks, A4 notebooks, legal pads, top-spiral legal pads, looseleaf paper - you get the picture. While I count myself a paper aficionado, and consider experimenting across product lines part of the fun, if you prefer to focus on the pens and/or inks you can stick to Clairefontaine and find pretty much any paper format you might need within that line.

• Consistent Quality. What I love about Clairefontaine is that you don’t need to think about whether it’s going to offer you a baseline-level of fountain pen friendliness. Although most people lump them together as “Clairefontaine/Rhodia”, I’ve generally found Clairefontaine to be more consistent across batches and the product line as a whole.

• Cost Effectiveness. Whether it’s those of us who use fountain pens on a daily basis at work, or prolific journalers who can fill a 100+ page notebook in a matter of weeks, most people have to pay attention to the cost of this hobby on some level. While they’ve had to raise prices over the past couple of years, Clairefontaine paper is still some of the more reasonably priced fountain pen friendly stationery on the market. As I write this, notebooks containing Clairefontaine paper range from $5.50 to $23, depending on size and page volume.

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Clairefontaine paper is famous for how well it handles ink. The bright white version showcases color and shading fairly well. It also holds up to extremely wet pens and inks, though as discussed further below, that may affect dry time.

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As you can see, there is zero bleed-through from handwriting. It took me FOUR passes with a q-tip - basically until the paper soaked through and began disintegrating, before I saw any bleeding whatsoever from the ink swab. Even then, it only bled along the “weak spots” in the paper (i.e., where the ruling was printed).

That’s not to say that Clairefontaine doesn’t have it’s drawbacks, and any well-rounded review should point them out. First of all, dry time can be an issue, especially with wet and/or super-saturated inks. What makes Clairefontaine paper so ink-friendly is the fact that the paper is coated to minimize feathering and bleed-through, so it takes longer to dry because the paper doesn’t absorb as much ink as other brands. As a result, many left handers find that that ink frequently smears, and certain Noodler’s and Organics Studio formulations will literally never dry on this paper. On a similar note, because this paper tends to feel very smooth, I find it less satisfying to use with pencil. While to me this is more of a tactile issue, some people claim that graphite smears more easily on Clairefontaine and other coated papers. YMMV.

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Clairefontaine’s 1951 Collection, with it’s school-days-retro vibe, has been incredibly popular.

Takeaways and Where to Buy

I always keep Clairefontaine paper close at hand. I opened my “notebook stash drawer” in my office desk yesterday and three Clairefontaine products jumped out at me: (1) a packet of French-ruled looseleaf sheets, which will be returning to the shop soon; (2) a “Pupitre” legal-style A4 pad; and (3) a spiral-bound A4 French-ruled notebook. I started with Clairefontaine paper way back in college, when I first got into fountain pens, and at this point I consider myself a lifer with this brand.

In the interest of full disclosure (though most readers probably already know this) we do sell Clairefontaine directly via our own shop, though my love of this paper predates my status as a retailer by decades. You can generally find this paper at most pen retailers worldwide.

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Further Reading

I’ve previously reviewed a few specific iterations of Clairefontaine Paper, including my favorite French/Seyes-ruled layout, which is what got me hooked on quality stationery all those years ago. For a broader look at how different brands compare, and what I consider to be “fountain pen friendly”, check out our “Hierarchies of Fountain Pen Friendly Paper” post. This particular article has a vibrant comments section, from which I’ve already picked up several new suggestions on additional brands to review and/or carry in the shop. Please add to the conversation if you don’t see one of your own favorites represented!

New Arrivals: New Styles from Clairefontaine, Plus Restocks on Old Favorites!

I arrived home to a huge shipment (8 boxes) from Exaclair this weekend, including restocks on most Clairefontaine favorites, including the larger Triomphe writing pads, French-ruled notebooks, and the incredibly popular clothbound “1951 Series”. We are also restocked on the Quo Vadis Habana, my favorite of the bound journal/notebooks, which features Clairefontaine dot grid paper. But that’s not all!

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Enough of the Restocks: What’s New? Triomphe Notebooks, Dot Grid Journals, Reporter-Style Pads and More!

We’ve been wanting to expand our selection of Clairefontaine for some time - I generally find the entire line to be excellent, especially given the often-rare combination of fountain pen friendly paper and an accessible price point. There’s a lot to be excited about, as new arrivals include:

• Triomphe Notebooks, in both white and ivory paper, lined or blank! These were recently released - the Triomphe paper is incredibly fountain pen friendly and popular for personal correspondence, and to have it available in notebook form is an exciting development.

• Clairefontaine Classic “Pupitre” Reporter-style Writing Tablets, which feature perforated pages of Clairefontaine’s classic 90g white paper, ruled or grid. We have these top-bound spiral pads in four different sizes including pocket, classic reporter, A5, and A4.

• Clairefontaine “Forever” A5 Spiral Notebook. Featuring 100% recycled paper, these spiral notebooks are lined and entirely micro-perforated, so that you can remove pages for ease of filing/discarding/scanning, whatever you may like. More notebooks need to be perforated for easy page removal!

• My Essentials A5 Bound Journals, which are threadbound notebooks featuring a slightly more absorbent (and quicker drying) dot grid ivory paper. These are a perfect solution for bullet journaling, with a table of contents and numbered pages.

• Life.unplugged Pocket Duo Notebooks, which are slightly smaller than a Field Notes and feature lined 90g fountain-pen friendly paper. Sold in packs of two: one colored and one black notebook.

Happy Shopping!

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The Gentleman Stationer is an authorized retailer of all brands sold.

Sunday Reading for July 23, 2023

1. Journaling Series: Journaling Through Fear (via Writing at Large). The second installment of this excellent series on journaling techniques!

2. Hypothetical! Top 5 (via Weirdoforest Pens). I always love reading people’s Top 5 lists. This one takes an interesting approach in that it discusses top pens for five different use cases.

3. #21PenQuestions (via Left Hook Pens). I still love reading these!

4. Introducing the Touchstone (via Penquisition). I can’t wait to see these in person at the D.C. Pen Show. Congratulations to Evan on the pen release!

5. Curating an Ink Collection (via Well-Appointed Desk). I’ve de-stashed many of my inks over the past few years, but I really need a better way of organizing and curating for quick reference.

6. Eye Candy: Troublemaker Foxglove (via A Fleeting Ripple). I’m glad I’m not the only one who consistently finds multi-shading/multi-chromatic inks on the drier side, across most brands.

7. Lamy Safari: Re-Trying It (via Stationery Pizza). Sometimes you can “discover” a new pen by trying it again after some time, even years!

8. Esterbrook Paradise JR Key Lime, 1.1mm Stub (via KraftyCats). Chloe reviews Esterbrook’s more compact “JR” model from the summer-themed “Paradise” line.

9. Tibaldi N60 Fountain Pen Review (via Blake’s Broadcast). The ebonite feed has become Tibaldi’s market niche, even with their stainless steel nibs.

10. Tailored Pen Co. Wildflowers (via Rachel’s Reflections). I’m hearing more about Tailored Pen Co. recently, and these blanks incorporating dried flowers into the acrylic are also becoming quite popular.

11. A New Start Screams for a Starter Currently Inked (via mnmlscholar). Congratulations on the new start!

12. Meet Your Maker: Eric Sands, Atelier Lusso (via Pen Addict - Caroline). I’m looking forward to seeing Atelier Lusso pens in person at the upcoming San Francisco Pen Show, where I notice they are signed up to have a table!

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In Case You Missed It….

This week on the blog, I did a “bag dump” post! I’ve not talked about my everyday work carry in some time. Since I was on the road for a long weekend visiting NYC, I also published a post about visiting pen stores, and what I focus on when shopping in person.

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Finally, don’t miss this week’s giveaway post over on Instagram! We’re giving away a bottle of our “Summer Sangria” fountain pen ink that’s typically only sold packaged with our current Hinze Fountain Pen Collaboration (see additional details below)!

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We’re down to the last handful of T.G.S. x Hinze Pens collaboration fountain pens, all of which are now available with the nano-ceramic plated Crimson nibs.

This Week in the T.G.S. Curated Shop

We’re busy preparing for the upcoming Washington, D.C. and San Francisco Pen Shows - in addition to the, gulp, Holiday Shopping Season which is going to be here sooner than anyone would like - and accordingly have constant new arrivals and restocks on the way. This week saw the arrival of Midori A5 Soft Color Pads (the lightweight writing pad equivalent of the Soft Color A5 Notebooks), as well as a full restock of Lochby Quattro pen cases and Field Journal notebooks!

Letter Writing

Hinze Pens

Stalogy

Laban Inks

Other Ways to Support T.G.S. and Gently Used Update!

Everything that didn’t sell to Patreon members, including some older limited edition Baron Fig items and notebooks, is now available for general purchase on the “Gently Used” page! If you’re interested in early access and a right of first refusal for the periodic sales, consider T.G.S. Patreon, which features not only access to meetups and the early gently used sales, but more exclusive content. Patreon support starts as low as $3 per month, and if you pay annually there is a further discount. In addition to purchases from The Curated Shop, Patreon allows us to continue to grow the site without relying on advertisements and affiliate marketing. If you’re interested in meetups and exclusive content, or simply supporting the site, we greatly appreciate your support!

2023 Travelogue: What I Consider When Visiting Pen Stores and Shopping at Smaller Retailers in General

As you may have seen from my Instagram feed, I took a short trip to New York City to visit family for the long weekend, and as usual ended up with a bit of free time. I have a solid list of 3-5 stationery stores in NYC that I regularly try to visit when I’m in town, including Yoseka Stationery, Kinokuniya, Goods for the Study, and sometimes Fountain Pen Hospital. As someone with fairly easy access to pretty much any stationery products I want to see, I often get asked what I look for when shopping in person.

1. Exclusive Items. These days, so many things are easy to find online that when I’m traveling, I spend most of my time on the lookout for store-exclusive items, including product collaborations. As I’m well-aware, lots of work goes into developing these products - they can require large minimum quantity orders and a huge leap of faith - and I often go out of my way to pick one up if it’s something that even remotely interests me. Consider it my way to do what I can to support other retailers in the community. For example, when I visited Yoseka Stationery back in January, I made sure to pick up one of their exclusive Yoseka Green Stalogy 365 Days notebooks.

2. Products I Want to Learn More About. Sometimes I need to see a product in person to understand it better before I decide to purchase. Case in point: this trip I picked up one of the Uniball Kuru Toga Dive mechanical pencils at Kinokuniya. I’ve been following the hype/controversy surrounding this fairly pricey capped mechanical pencil - which not only includes the Kuru Toga rotating lead mechanism but also an auto-feed that advances the lead automatically - and was hesitant to purchase one “for science” with the online prices ticking up past $100 on the secondary market. (For those who have not been following this “drama”, the pencils first launched in the U.S. at around $60, and apparently were promptly snapped up by scalpers, which then prompted a general price hike by Uniball.) The design of the pencil intrigued me enough in person to pick one up at a price point in between the launch price and secondary, and I’ll be posting a review at some point in the future.

3. Stuff That May Not Be Exclusive, But Not Typically Sold Online. While you can find almost anything online these days, many store exclusives and brand collaborations are more difficult to locate at reasonable prices, and some stores simply don’t list all of their less common stock online. Kinokuniya in NYC often has interesting multi pens (including variations of the Uniball Jetstream) and other versions/colors of the Kuru-Toga mechanical pencils. I’m sure some of the items pictured here have been around for a while, but they’re new to me, and I don’t spend a ton of time in online forums or on Reddit so if I hadn’t visited Kinokuniya in person I might not have discovered them.

I have another day of exploration ahead of me! If you have a favorite NYC-area stationery store that’s not mentioned here, leave a comment and let me know!

This post does not contain paid third party affiliate links. The Gentleman Stationer is supported entirely by purchases through the T.G.S. Curated Shop and pledges via the T.G.S. Patreon Program.

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