Legacy Manufacturers

I think we probably all know what is meant by legacy manufacturers in the fountain pen world, brands like Parker, Waterman and Sheaffer whose vintage pens are remarkable, but who have stagnated a bit with regards to their current production line. Although it feels a little harsh to say it I'd say these are brands …

Waxing, Waning and Keeping The Hobby Interesting

So you may have noticed a bit of a lack of posts round here lately, for which I'd like to offer an apology. On the plus side it has prompted me to write what I hope should be an interesting post. So part of the reason for my absence on the blog has been that …

Review: The Pilot Vanishing Point

So there are some pens that are real cult classics in the fountain pen world, pens that most of us either own or are seriously considering owning. The Pilot Vanishing point/Capless is most definitely one of them. One of a limited number of truly practical retractable fountain pens I think the Pilot Vanishing Point offers …

Flex Nibs Part 3: Modern Flex

So I've had quite a busy week and these flex nibs posts have taken quite a lot of work to compile, so there's no review this Sunday, instead sit back for the last of the flex nib primers. So here we are at the third and final part of the series on flex nibs, and …

Review: The Omas Tokyo

I generally try to avoid owning pens just because I fancy owning one, I normally try to have a couple of reason why I think I'll like it rather than just jumping down the rabbit hole because of some vague feeling of wanting a particular pen. However when faced with an Omas I might actually …

Flex Nibs Part 2: Vintage Flex Nibs

 So in the first part of this series we looked at defining the various qualities that go together to make a flex nib. In part two of this series we'll be looking at what the fabled vintage flex nibs have to offer.   Any post claiming to deal with vintage flex nibs as a single …

Review: The Pelikan M800 Demonstrator

The Pelikan M800 is one of those pens that is pretty often raved about, in fact I think Peter Twydle even called it the perfect modern fountain pen, certainly for many it is a grail pen worthy of the status. Until quite recently I had only tried the smaller pens in Pelikan's line up but …

Flex Nibs Part 1: Defining Flex

 So welcome to what will be a two part series on that most talked about of questions, flex nibs. These three posts will be the product of a not insignificant amount of research, as well as the experience gained over a number of years of buying and using flex nibs. The plan is to create …

Review: The TWSBI Eco T

So my journey into fountain pens was not exactly how most people start. I started out with vintage, unusual, I know. So this has meant that as my collection is missing most of the tradition starter pens, no Safaris, Metros or TWSBIs. That was until about three weeks ago when semi on a whim I …

Ink Permanence: Or is everything just going to fade away?

  I have no data for this, but I imagine most fountain pen users have more bottles of ink than pens, and quite a lot of us can probably say they have more ink than they are ever likely to use. With that being the case it seemed remiss that I haven't yet done a …