The Midori MD Notebook (A5 Gridded): A Review

(Susan M. Pigott is a fountain pen collector, pen and paperholic, photographer, and professor. You can find more from Susan on her blog Scribalishess.)

The Midori MD Notebook is an A5-sized, 88 page (176 pages front and back) notebook with cream paper. I couldn’t find the actual paper weight on the Midori site, but they describe the paper as

"provid[ing] a fine balance between a slight catch on the paper when writing and a smooth writing feel. With this paper, you can enjoy the sensation of writing."

After writing on this notebook for a couple of weeks, I completely agree with that description.

The MD Notebook is packaged in a clear cellophane package. The notebook is wrapped in slightly opaque paraffin paper that you can remove or leave on for protection. I have a thing about the texture and crinkly sound of paraffin paper, so I’m keeping my notebook wrapped.

The notebook is bound in cardstock (though Midori is careful to say that this is not a cover—it’s more like the end pages you would find in a hardbound book. The notebook pages are bound using the traditional thread-stitched method. This allows the book to open completely flat.

In minimalistic fashion, the binding and stitching can be seen through the cheesecloth tape on the spine. This would normally be hidden underneath a hardbound cover. It really is quite beautiful. You can even see the book ribbon through the tape.

I chose the gridded version of the MD Notebook, but they also come in blank and 7mm lined. The gridded lines are 5mm, and there are tiny dots along the margins marking every 10 squares on the long edge and 10 and 5 squares long the top edge. This allows you to count characters if you like, or use the dots to create even grids.

I tested my MD Notebook in several different ways. I tried it with different pens and inks writing alphabets. It handled all three pens and inks perfectly with no bleed-through. The writing does show through the paper slightly, but I couldn’t get a good photo of it.

Top: Wahl-Eversharp Decoband with Kyo-Iro Moonlight ink, Middle: Pilot Custom 92 with Iroshizuku Shin-Kai ink; Bottom: Conid Minimalistica with Diamine Purple Pazzazz

One of the things I love about grid paper is the fact that you can write on it either in portrait or landscape. So, next I created a to-do chart for my Fall classes. The gridlines make it easy to create columns and checkboxes.

Next, I tested the paper with all of my currently-inked pens, a gel pen, and a rollerball. Again, no complaints. All the inks performed well.

Then I wrote a test page using the Emancipation Proclamation for text. I found the 5mm grid size to be too small for my usual handwriting. That’s probably because I’ve gotten accustomed to 7mm lines in my journal. For people who print or write using fine nibs, the size should be adequate. By the way, if you read the quote carefully (please don’t) you’ll see that I totally muffed it up. My eyes skipped an entire paragraph, so I’d make a horrible scribe.

I also did some ink swabs to see how the paper handled thick, wet ink. Once again, it aced the test. No bleedthrough at all.

The MD Notebook paper is really, really nice. I’m a Tomoe River Paper fan, but I must say, this MD Notebook is giving my Seven Seas Journal a run for the money. Both kinds of paper are fountain-pen friendly. Both papers come in creamy colors. Both papers are bleed-resistant. Both display sheeny inks well.

Hobonichi Cousin Tomoe Left; MD Notebook Right

The main difference between the two is Tomoe River Paper feels much thinner and smoother. MD Paper is thicker, and it has some tooth to it. That’s not to say that the paper is rough or catches your nib. It just provides more feedback.

Diamine Purple Pazzazz ink

You can purchase the Midori MD A5 Notebook Gridded at JetPens for $14.00. They also carry the blank and lined versions. If you want a sleek cover for your MD Notebook, you can get a goatskin cover for $84.00.

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Craft Design Technology A5 Notepad Review

It’s a rare day when I miss a cool Japanese stationery product, but the Craft Design Technology A5 Notepad escaped my field of view until Caroline Weaver of C.W. Pencil Enterprises mentioned it to Myke and I on Episode 252 of The Pen Addict Podcast.

I’ve reviewed other Craft Design Technology (CDT for short) products in the past, and I refer to them as a design firm in the stationery business. They don’t manufacture their own goods, but partner with existing brands to reimagine products with the CDT aesthetic. Most of that aesthetic involves mint green.

For this notepad, CDT partnered with Life Notebooks. It is a desk pad with top-perforated sheets in an A5 size. The paper is Life’s standard cream colored offering with a mint green grid - aka the CDT touch.

The quality of this notepad - as expected - is top notch. The construction is solid, and the paper performance with nearly any pen and pencil is perfect. The grid pattern is even printed on both sides, which is not something you always see when a plain border is used around the edge of the page.

What surprised me the most about the paper was how it handled pencil. With a cream colored background I thought graphite would blend in and be hard to see, but the opposite took place. It practically jumps off the page with HB and 2B grades and looks great. I see why Caroline likes this pad so much.

If you are waiting for the hammer to drop on this product, here it is. It’s $12 for a 50 page notepad. This is Craft Design’s modus operandi. They collaborate with other brands and put the CDT twist on existing products. That comes at a cost. A simple example is the Camel HB pencil. The standard model from Camel is $1.50. The CDT Camel HB is $2.00. The internals are the same, only the color and stamping on the pencil are different.

A 50 cent increase on a pencil isn’t a large sum of money, but you see where this is headed as you climb the ladder. I’m not opposed to this business model by any stretch - I own several CDT products that I enjoy. I just want you to be aware that you are paying for minty freshness, not added performance. But sometimes all it takes is a fresh coat of paint for me to open my wallet.

(I paid full price for these goods with my own money.)

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Clairefontaine Triomphe Stationery: A5 Tablet and Envelopes Review

(Susan M. Pigott is a fountain pen collector, pen and paperholic, photographer, and professor. You can find more from Susan on her blog Scribalishess.)

I really wish I wrote more letters than I do. A few years ago, I signed up to be pen pals with several other pen addicts. It was actually really fun. I had an Australian, British, and several American pen friends, and we wrote back and forth for almost a year. But then I got overwhelmed at work and extremely depressed, and I just . . . stopped. I’m really sorry that I did.

Regardless, I still write to a few people occasionally. When I do write letters, I prefer using nice stationery, and Clairefontaine is one of the best brands. I’m reviewing the Clairefontaine A5 blank tablet and the small envelopes.

The A5 tablet has 50 sheets of 90g acid-free, pH neutral paper. The first page is lined so you can use it as a guide. The other pages are smooth-as-silk, pure white paper.

The paper is glued to form a tablet, but pages are easy to remove without tearing them.

I tested the paper with several fountain pens, a rollerball, some gel pens, and a Sharpie. All of them wrote beautifully on this paper.

Although some of the broader nibbed pens’ ink showed through slightly, the only bleed through came from the Sharpie. But I doubt most people would use Sharpie pens to write letters on nice stationery.

The only pen that bled through was the Sharpie (the last lines in green).

The Clairefontaine paper is super smooth, so I tested a few inks for dry times. As I suspected, if you use broad nibs and wet inks, the dry time on this paper is significant. The only ink that dried fairly quickly was Iroshizuku Shin-Kai, and it’s drier than my other Iroshizuku inks. In any case, just keep in mind that fountain pen ink will take some time to dry on this paper. Lefties may find this paper difficult to use.

Although I appeciate that Clairefontaine provides one sheet of lined paper as a guide, the lines aren’t dark enough for me. I love SketchyNotebook’s guides. They are dark and provide a smooth surface on which to write.

The Clairefontaine small envelopes (114mm x 162mm) come in a package of 25. They use the same lovely 90g paper, and they have a peel and stick closure. No licking necessary.

The envelopes hold up just as well as the paper, as you would expect.

I used a cool little template I got from JetPens to address the envelope. It’s called the Lettermate Companion Envelope Addressing Guide. It’s really nice to have something to keep the lines straight.

You can buy Clairefontaine stationery from Goulet Pens. The A5 tablet is just $5.00, and the set of 25 envelopes is also $5.00.

If you’re interested in the SketchyNotebook templates, you can find out more here. And you can get the Lettermate Companion Envelope Addressing Guide for $9.95 at JetPens.

And, hey, if you’re interested in being my pen pal, I’m really awful at it, but we can give it a go.

(Goulet Pens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

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Enjoy reading The Pen Addict? Then consider becoming a member to receive additional weekly content, giveaways, and discounts in The Pen Addict shop. Plus, you support me and the site directly, which I am very grateful for.

Membership starts at just $5/month, with a discounted annual option available. To find out more about membership click here and join us!