The Agony of Choice

“Oh woe is me!” So much stationery, so little time. If you’re here, you probably have little or no sympathy for my difficulty. I’ll admit, it’s a wonderful problem to have.

Several people write for our blog - Paw Prints. Regular articles come from Amanda, Scrib and me, Stuart. All three of us are fountain pen users. As we’re all super-powered nerdy hipsters, we hang out in Slack (which is where super nerdy hipsters used to hang out) and the talk often turns to “ink-friendly” notebooks, and how we don't stock enough of them. (Honestly, the grief I get.)

We do carry a lot of ink-friendly stuff. Off the top of my head, there’s Clairefontaine, Rhodia, MD, Pebble Stationery Co, Darkstar, Story Supply, Silvine, Back Pocket Co, and Dappernotes. I use fountain pen in my Waverley Tartan Commonplace notebook too.

The reality is that my fellow stationery addicts and I are on a perpetual search for new paper and notebooks. As everybody’s taste is unique, and evolves, the quest will never end.

So it is, that I’m assessing a table full of notebooks, testing paper new and old. I do keep an eye on established lines. As many will tell you, companies that produce notebooks do change the paper that they use and/or the manufacturer. Moleskine and Leuchtturm1917 both have inferior paper now than previously, for example. Most exciting though are the new lines. Notebooks that I have never seen before. That’s real fun.

I look at the quality of finish and general appeal. There are plenty of notebooks that are not my cup of tea, but if they're well-made, then we’ll stock them.

We only carry stock that I have had a chance to play with, and I’m delighted to say that there’s some really cool stuff here, which will be in stock soon. Amanda and Scrib will, of course, get some samples to pull apart and review.