Posts filed under Notebook Reviews

Hi Mojimoji Tagged Life Gear Memo Pad Review

(Jeff Abbott is a regular contributor at The Pen Addict. You can find more from Jeff online at Draft Evolution and Twitter.)

The Hi Mojimoji Tagged Life Gear memo pads (or Tagged memo pads for short) is a unique and cute memo pad that is well-suited to short jots and tearing out pages for one-off uses, but it has some limitations. Still, the aesthetic is spot on and makes me like the notebook despite its paper quality.

Let’s start with the specifications for the notebook I have on hand, which is the “small” version. It features a unique shape reminiscent of a retail tag, complete with a grommeted hole in the upper left-hand corner of the book. There are 100 sheets in this pad, and each one is perforated for easy removal. The curved sides of the notebook give it a unique flair, but also make it easier to handle.

One of the major features this notebook touts is the water-resistant nature of the paper, which fits nicely with the water/ocean theme that this collection of notebooks display on their covers. There are several covers to choose from, including Anchor (featured in this review), Kingfisher, Lifesaving Float, Rudder, Tyrolean Hat, and Mt. Everest. All styles are available in a large or small size, but they all contain 5mm graph paper inside.

The “small” notebooks are about 2.6 x 4.4 inches, while the “large” notebooks are about 3 x 5 inches. This isn’t a huge difference, and the price is only a dollar apart as well.

On the outside, these notebooks are definitely an eye-catcher. They use interesting colors and high-quality symbols for each theme. The uniform design makes it tempting to collect all six styles, but you have to be comfortable with the paper before committing to that many notebooks.

The paper is “water-resistant,” which always comes with trade-offs. To make paper water-resistant requires a special coating. This coating usually causes certain inks to act much differently than usual — namely, fountain pen and some gel inks.

In general, traditional ballpoint and gel inks won’t have a problem with this kind of paper — pencil is also a great pairing — but don’t count on using your favorite fountain pens or rollerballs with this paper. It bleeds like crazy and shows through to the back side very clearly. The price of water-resistance!

Outside of the expected limitations caused by the water-resistant coating on the paper, it’s a handy little notepad. The graph is the perfect size, the quality is consistent, and it works well with most pens/pencils (as long as they’re not water-based inks).

I’ve had a couple of issues with this notebook that make me pause. One of them is that tearing sheets out of the pad is incredibly difficult/problematic. 100% of the sheets I’ve pulled out have either ripped down into the writing area or pulled additional paper from the binding. None of the sheets have torn out cleanly along the perforations. The purpose of this memo book feels like it’s meant to shed pages rather than be a permanent store of old notes. That being the case, I would expect a better tearing experience. I’m really anxious now about tearing the page when removing a sheet, which shouldn’t be the case.

For the price, you can definitely pick up a 3-pack of better made notebooks. $10 is a standard price for pocket notebooks and memo pads, but these aren’t top performers in my experience. If you dig the aesthetic, though, the Tagged memo books are a good water-resistant memo book.

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

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Posted on March 14, 2018 by Jeff Abbott and filed under Tagged, Notebook Reviews.

LIFE Stationery Margin A5 Side Bound Notebook Review

(Jeff Abbott is a regular contributor at The Pen Addict. You can find more from Jeff online at Draft Evolution and Twitter.)

When it comes to notebooks, you can find one for every specific purpose. Be it certain industries, odd rulings, or other constraints and requirements, there’s probably a notebook for it. I’ve always found that interesting, and it’s no surprise that I was intrigued by the Life Margin notebook.

The Life Margin notebook is a soft cover notebook with 80 pages of smooth, ivory paper that feels incredible to the touch and when writing. Like the other Life notebooks, this is some seriously good stuff. It’s a simple notebook, but it’s also simply wonderful.

On the outside, the Margin notebook is a craft paper material that bends easily, but is still resilient. Depending on the paper rule, the branding and cloth binding material is red (plain), blue (ruled), or yellow (graph). Apart from the minimal product information on the covers, there’s nothing else, which gives it a utilitarian feel. The Margin notebook is A5 in size and is held together by stitching and cloth tape. Overall, it has a clean, professional look on the outside.

On the inside, you’re greeted with a minimal front page that has a space for creating an "index" of your writings, or a place to write down your contact information. After that, we get to the good stuff. This paper is some of my favorite, and there’s 80 pages of it in this little notebook. It’s a light ivory color and has a special coating on it to make it extra smooth. Despite the coating, it handles all types of inks, graphite, etc. with ease. Dry times for inks aren’t affected, and it also does a decent job of preventing show-through on the back of the page.

Apart from the super wet Schmidt P8126 refill, the show-through is minimal and leaves the back pages perfectly usable for other writing. If you typically use wet pens, it will depend on what kind of ink you use with this notebook. In some cases, you may not be able to use the back page.

Writing on this paper is an incredibly enjoyable experience. It’s smooth when writing, has a good weight, and also has a pleasant color. The pages lay open easily, and the notebook closes flat when not in use. The binding seems strong, but also very pliable. There are no pages numbers in the notebook, but it does boast something special.

Like the name implies, this notebook features a vertical margin line about 1.5 inches or 35mm from the left side of the page. It’s an unobtrusive light gray line that’s helpful for leaving a (you guessed it) margin on the left side for notes, edits, or whatever else. Due to the somewhat light weight of the paper, you can also see the margin line showing throw from the back page, which gives you a handy right margin as well. Due to the light ink, it’s easy to disregard the margin when you don’t need it. And, the margin is present on each ruling type. I found the margin useful for making outlines and lists, but I could also see how it would be useful for note-taking and planning. Given the open structure, you can use it in whatever way makes sense to you in different situations.

Life notebooks have long been a favorite of mine due to the paper and build quality, and the Margin notebook is no exception.

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

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Posted on March 7, 2018 by Jeff Abbott and filed under Life Notebooks, Notebook Reviews.

Stillman & Birn Nova Sketchbook Review

(Sarah Read is an author, editor, yarn artist, and pen/paper/ink addict. You can find more about her at her website and on Twitter.)

I have long harbored a misconception that tinted paper would obscure the vibrancy I love so much in most of my media. I tend to choose my art supplies for their colors, and often seek the contrast of a white background. But what about lovely pale colors and pastels? Tinted paper to the rescue--it's the perfect background for showing off a whole range of color. The Stillman & Birn sketchbook paper has just the right hue to make any color pop and can stand up to an incredible range of wet and dry media.

The Nova sketchbook is 5.5" by 8.5", or about A5 size, and has beige paper. There is also a smaller version, as well as books with grey, black, or white paper, soft or hard cover, thread or wire binding. There's likely a version that suits your fancy. This softcover book has a papery faux-leather cover. It's nicely flexible and feels sturdy enough to stand up to some abuse. The book itself wears well--it doesn't get shabby so much as takes on a character of its own. I love that in a book.

The binding is thread and glue. It is a bit stiff at first, but with training, it does lie flat fairly well. It still does tend to fall open to places where the glue has been broken and remains stiffer in other places, but when it's in use, it opens well and doesn't bow the pages. The cover is plain matte black with a smooth texture logo on the back. It's very minimal, almost so that it can be tricky to open it the right way unless you mark it yourself somehow, or until it takes on that recognizable character. There are no bookmarks or pockets or frills of any sort. I do wish it had a few of these conveniences. I admire the minimalist aesthetic of it, but there are some frills that make a good tool a great tool.

The best part of the book is, of course, the paper itself. There are 46 sheets of 150 gsm light brown paper. It's quite thick and sturdy, with a fair amount of texture. I tried out a wide variety of my artsy arsenal, and all of them did well on the paper. It's a bit toothy--so very fine pens, whether felt-tip fineliners, gel pens, or fountain pens, can feel a bit snaggy. Pencil also went down quite thick and left a shiny layer of graphite. But colored pencils and pastels were a real delight, and watercolor worked a treat. Markers, liquid inks, and paints did not show through at all, though markers soaked in a bit and didn't show the vibrancy of other media. I did one full page in a wash to see how it would hold up to wetness, and it dried flat with only minimal rippling. The paper is said to be formulated with both internal and surface sizing, so it can handle wet media. It does have a long dry time because of this, so paint markers had to sit for quite a while before they fully dried.

The versatility of this paper invites play, and it makes me want to come back to it and try new things. One really can't ask for much better from an art supply--permission to play can be half the battle, and this book practically dares you to push its boundaries. If you like to play with a wide variety of media, or if you want to see what using a tinted background does for your color vibrancy, this is a great product to work with.

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

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