Link Love: Life Changes

Link Love: Life Changes

While recovering from my awful cold last week, I also turned my life upside down. I put in my notice to quit my real jobby-job to do focus on being a pen nerd, freelance designer and general layabout full-time. I will have completed my transition sometime in Mid-April.

Being a full-time entrepreneur is something I’ve always wondered if I could make work and I finally realized, “If not now, when?” So, the good news, for you my lovely readers, is that I will be able to put more time and energy into new stationery products, more pen shows, and more content here and on Patreon. Yes, really! You are now my job!

I have lots of plans for new projects and I am looking forward to the future. I hope you will too. If there’s any reviews, content, extras or new products you’ve always wanted to see from The Desk, drop your suggestions in the comments or email me (use the “Ask the Desk” link to email me, if you want to be sneaky or if you want to hire me to design logos, products, collabs or anything!).

Pens:

Ink:

Notebooks & Paper:

Art & Creativity:

Other Interesting Things:

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Ink review: De Atramentis Peach (Scented)

As I continue to stroll my way though peach inks, this week’s review is De Atramentis Peach (45ml, $14.00). Now I don’t know how I missed it, but this is one of their fragrance inks. Normally that would be a detractor for me, but this one smelled very lightly of peaches. It reminded me of my favorite peach tea.

It is not, however, that Peach Fuzz Pantone look-alike. It is ripe, juicy, orangey-red peach. The ink itself is primarily orange, and with no fancy bells or whistles. It doesn’t shade that much, and there’s no sheen or sparkle. What there is, is a vibrant peachy orange that I really like.

In comparison to the inks I own, it came closest to Sailor Apricot, and not too far off of J. Herbin Orange Indien. Mont Blanc Lucky Orange wasn’t quite close enough.

The only problem I noticed, was that the ink seems to feather a bit on the Mnemosyne A5 paper, particularly in the ink splotches. In regular writing there are no issues though. Overall this wasn’t the ethereal peach color I was looking for, but it’s a nice orange and will be a great summery color!


DISCLAIMER: Some of the items included in this review were provided to us free of charge for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

Pen Case Review: Girologio Denim 10-Pen Case

Pen Case Review: Girologio Denim 10-Pen Case

I was so happy to be introduced to the new Girologio Denim line of pen cases. I am always excited to see materials, other than leather, used for pen cases. Leather is a great option for a lot of people but having a non-leather option available is also great.

The denim 12-pen case ($52.60) is a dark indigo, soft fabric (that picks up cat hair like crazy so I apologize in advance for the hair in the photos. I tried to get it off but its a futile effort here at Cat Cottage) and features a stitched brown leatherette patch logo on the back like on the pocket of a pair of jeans. Cute!

The first thing I noticed after I loaded the case is that the fabric case, filled with pens, is a lot lighter than a leather case is once filled. I know that’s probably a big “duh!” for a lot of people but I forgot how much weight is added to a pen case, just in the materials that are used.

I tested a variety of pen sizes from long, chunky pens like Lamy Safaris and Opus 88 Koloros as well as some of my smaller, more slender pens like my YStudio Resin Fountain Pen to make sure the smaller pens don’t fall out. Getting the bulkier pens into the case the first time might require tugging a little bit on the elastic to loosen up the elastic to make it easier to slide them in or out.

With the more slender pens, the zipper lip keeps the smaller pens from falling out but some pens are slender enough that caution may need to be taken to make sure they don’t fall out.

There are a variety of other case options available from Girologio in the denim line from 1- and 2-pen sleeves to a 96-pen briefcase! There’s a size for everyone.

Overall, I am really happy with this case. An adjustable elastic would make this case almost perfect — if I could just figure out a way to charm the fabric not to attract cat hair!


DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided free of charge by Girologio for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

Link Love: Sick & Tired Edition

Link Love: Sick & Tired Edition

This week, I spent a lot of time googling things no one wants to search for:

  • Cold or Flu: How to tell the difference?
  • Bronchitis Symptoms
  • Will my insurance cover…?
  • Etc.

So, if you haven’t guessed, I picked up a virus. Or a bacterial infection. Either way, I have felt like crap all week. As a result, I have not spent much time online, in forums or reading any news in the pen community. What did I miss?

Pens:

Ink:

Pencils:

Notebooks & Paper:

Art & Creativity:

Other Interesting Things:

We need each other and I need some more Nyquil. Please support our sponsors, affiliates or join our Patreon. Your patronage supports this site. Without them, and without you, we could not continue to do what we do. Thank you!

Ink Review: Private Reserve Ink, Infinity Blue

Ana always comes back from pen shows with goodies for me to try and review, and this time was no exception. When she handed me a bottle of Private Reserve Ink, Infinity Blue (60mL for $25 from Yafa Brands), I was intrigued. This new ink bears the Infinity name because it is developed to virtually never run dry.

We all have pens we fill and then use intermittently. Depending on a variety of factors (the pen, the cap tightness, the specific ink, the climate) that pen may or may not write fluidly the next time you pick it up. Infinity ink has been formulated so that intermittent use, or going “virtually capless” shouldn’t result in hard starts.

This was going to be fun I thought. I filled up my Estie with the Infinity Blue and started my test. Then I did something that felt incredibly wrong: I left the cap off overnight.

When I came back the next morning, I expected the pen to start, right? Well it didn’t exactly. As you can see, after less than 24 hours capless, the pen did not write fluidly to start. I will say that I touched the back of the nib, and the feed to a tissue, and allowed ink to collect there for a few moments. After that, the pen began to write well again. So it didn’t need the full water treatment, but it definitely wasn’t quite ready for capless.

For my next test, I left the cap on, but a little loose (not fully screwed on). When I came back a few days later, I had the same experience.

My final test was leaving the pen uncapped during a meeting (so approximately an hour or so). This was the only time the pen wrote fluidly with no coaxing.

My test is obviously not exhaustive since I only used one pen, but I’d say my results with that one pen are fair to middling. I didn’t have to get up and run water over the nib to get it started, but it didn’t just write the second I picked it up. I expect that it would work well in a pen that you use intermittently that you keep capped, regardless of if the seal were super tight, but I’m not sure I’m ready to go with “it can be virtually cap-off ‘forever’.”

Have you tried this ink? What are your thoughts?


DISCLAIMER: Thanks to Yafa Brands for providing us a bottle of Private Reserve Ink in Infinity Blue for review. Please see the About page for more details.

Fountain Pen Review: Rubato Fountain Pen

Fountain Pen Review: Rubato Fountain Pen

One of the best things about pen shows is discovering a new-to-me creator. At the California Pen Show, I was able to walk around a bit on Sunday and stumbled across Rubato Pen Studio.

Her handcrafted mini pens were displayed on vintage cake stands like the candy-colored confections they are. Some of the pens featured charms on rings on the cap ends, others featured botanical embedded in the resin. There were pastel colors and glitter as well as shimmery tones.

She uses Schmidt nibs specifically because it allows the nibs to be interchangeable with a dip nib (specifically a Zebra G or similar). There is even mention on her web site that a brush pen unit can fit into the grip but I am a little vague about which specific model fits.

Her prices for these pens, made entirely by the creator — from the resins to the finished pens, was incredibly reasonable too. Like so much so I basically said, “Here, take my money!”

Each pen purchased at the show came in a cute little neoprene case (she let customers pick their own color so I picked lime green, of course!). Inside, she included some extra o-rings to eyedropper the pen, an empty cartridge and a full cartridge plus a syringe to fill cartridges. Since the pen is very small, a full sized converter will not fit but I think a Kaweco mini converter might fit. I will probably end up eyedropper filling mine after the cartridge I used is empty.

The pen I ended up purchasing has a shimmery pink grip section, a barrel that looks like strawberry ice cream melted into the base and a sprinkles cap. With the pink pompom on top like a cherry, the whole pen reminds me of a strawberry ice cream sundae. Or a birthday cupcake.  It just made me so happy the moment I saw it.

The cap is a golden translucent material with gold shimmer and the big metallic sprinkles embedded in the resin. It looks like magic in a pen.

The barrel section, shown above shows the same translucent golden shimmer but is layered towards the end with an array of pinky opaque colors.

The end of the barrel is threaded to accommodate the cap to make the pen a similar length to a Kaweco Sport but the Rubato Pen is a little shorter.

The Rubato Pen as the melted ice cream filling to two strawberry Kaweco cookies. The Rubato is ever-so-slightly shorter than the Kawecos.
When posted, the length of the Rubato pen is slightly shorter but very comparable to the Kaweco. The Rubato is a little weightier which makes up for the different in length, IMHO.

By the time I met up with friends for dinner on Sunday night, we discovered that all four of us had purchased a Rubato Pen independently of one another and wanted to show them off (we had all pocketed our little cases to do show-and-tell at dinner and had a good giggle when we all showed off Rubato Pen Studio pens!)

Three of the four Rubato Pen Studio pens that were purchased by me and friends at the CA Pen Show (photo credit to Diane!)

While I know Schmidt nibs aren’t everyone’s favorite, I think the reasoning behind Rubato choosing the Schmidt nib unit is a solid one. If you are someone who likes to play around with eye dropper mini pens or dip nibs and like a good sparkly pen, I highly recommend Rubato Pen Studio. It sounds like she will have a table at the SF Pen Show in August and hopefully, she will be restocking her online shop soon.


DISCLAIMER:  Some items included in this review were purchased with funds from our amazing Patrons. You can help support this blog (and keep me in ridiculous pink, pompom pens) by joining our Patreon. Please see the About page for more details.