The Pen Addict Podcast: Episode 433 - Why would you do that‽

The best pens at the pencil store. (via CWPE on IG)

I think about the business of stationery a lot. As popular as analog tools are, running a business is hard. Myke and I discuss a few of those businesses this week, and the changes and challenges they face.

Show Notes & Download Links

This episode of The Pen Addict is sponsored by:

Pen Chalet: Click the ‘podcast’ link at the top of the website and enter the password ‘penaddict’ for this week’s special offer, and to get your code for 10% off.

Harry's: Quality shaving and grooming products, at a fair price.

Colorverse Johannes Kepler Mini 3 Bottled Ink Set: 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 Colorverse Johannes Kepler Mini 3 Bottled Ink Set contains three 5ml bottles of dye-based fountain pen ink honoring Kepler, the famous astronomer and mathematician. The three inks in the set are called "Conjecture," (for Kepler's mathematical theorem on sphere packing) "Planetary Motion" (for Kepler's three laws) and "Somnium" (for Kepler's novel about a dream involving daemons and the moon).

The 5ml bottles are tear-drop shaped and adorable.

That said, the bottles aren't very practical. The opening is only .7mm, so you cannot insert nibs into it. A mini-pipette comes with each bottle. You can fill converters and eye-droppers with the pipette but not piston-filled pens.

Conjecture

Conjecture is a wine colored ink with fair saturation. It exhibits little shading and no sheen on Rhodia paper, and it is not waterproof. Although my dry times test shows the ink smearing after 30 seconds, I think that's because a bit of ink had pooled. The ink is actually quite dry.

The Col-o-dex card also shows some shading but no sheen. I had to soak up the ink splats with a paper towel because sunlight was fading (and I needed to take my photos), so it's possible that ruined any sheen effect.

Most interesting is the chromatography. This ink has a surprising bit of yellow-green in it along with pink and magenta. The yellow-green actually shows up in my water test (see above), but it wasn't evident in any of my writing, swatches, or splats.

Because the bottle is so small, I wasn't able to test the ink with my ruling pen. I opted instead for my widest Pilot Parallel pen (2.4mm). In this wider nib (which I dipped) the ink seems much lighter--more of a cherry blossom color than wine. Shading is much more evident in a wider nib.

Planetary Motion

Planetary Motion is a denim blue color. It has a bit of shading but no sheen and dries quickly. It is not waterproof, but when water is mixed with it, you can see the purple and teal undertones of the ink.

The Col-o-dex card shows off the shading of the ink. Again, it does not have any sheen (maybe due to my paper-towel blotting) but a bit of teal is visible in the splats.

The various dyes in Planetary Motion come out clearly in the chromatography: teal, turquoise, light blue, lavender, and purple.

Testing on Midori Paper with the Pilot Parallel 2.4mm demonstrates decent saturation and shading.

Somnium

Somnium is a jade green color with a tiny bit of shading. It has low saturation except in swabs. It dries fairly quickly and is not waterproof.

On the Col-o-dex card, the ink looks rather flat, with just a tiny bit of shading with the fine nib. Again, because I had to blot the splats, I don't know if there's any sheen with this ink. If there is, it's quite small.

Chromatography reveals different shades of green in this ink: olive green, light green, and blue green.

The Pilot Parallel pen brought out some good shading in Somnium.

I found all three Colorverse inks in this set to be quite dry, especially in the fine nib I used to do longer writing samples. The colors are understated, and I'm not enthusiastic about any of them. They are much more interesting in the Pilot Parallel nib, so I suggest using wide nibs for these inks.

You can buy the Colorverse Johannes Kepler Mini 3 Bottled Ink Set from Goldspot Pens for $19.50. Keep in mind that you'll need to use these inks in pens that are either eye-droppers or cartridge/converters. You could also transfer the ink to a sample bottle in order to fill a piston-based pen.

(Goldspot Pens provided this Colorverse Ink Set to Pen Addict free of charge for review purposes.)

---

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, for which I am very grateful.

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

Roterfaden A5 Notebook Review

My last review was for the Roterfaden Taschenbegleiter, a super great notebook cover system that utilizes clips instead of elastic bands or pockets to keep notebooks in place. Naturally, Roterfaden has their own line of notebooks that are made to be used with this cover.

The Roterfaden notebooks are very minimalist. The cover is thin kraft cardstock. The brand is stamped onto the front, as well as an abbreviated infographic of notebook specs. The binding is sewn with red thread (in keeping with the brand name). There is no spine to cover the stitching--it's an open edge that facilitates in the notebooks' main feature: it lays perfectly flat on every page, with no training necessary. It does this very well. With no thick cover and no spine, it feels more like writing on a pad of paper than in a notebook. Frankly, it takes some getting used to.

While there are a lot of benefits to this notebook's structure, it does feel a little flimsy. The kraft cover is not much thicker than printer paper, and the loose binding feels like it's going to fall apart (it hasn't). It doesn't feel like a substantial book. Of course, it's not meant to be used alone. It's supposed to be inserted into the Taschenbegleiter with several of its siblings--and that becomes its actual cover. It does work well when used with the Taschenbegleiter, and I think it would work okay in an elastic system, too, but it would likely not work in a notebook cover where the insert cover needs to be slid into a pocket. It isn't quite sturdy enough to hang on by one cover.

Between the covers are 84 pages of very decent paper. It is a cream color, and this one has a dot grid pattern. Lined and blank are also sometimes available. The paper handles all inks very well with minimal showthrough, and no feathering or bleeding. My Sharpie has run dry, so it didn't bleed through as much as it would have--you can see in the picture that even the dry ink did get through a bit. A fully-loaded Sharpie would do what it normally does to paper: annihilation.

This is a good notebook that serves its purpose well. It works for what it was designed to do, though it doesn't work for me outside of its intended purpose. That is, I wouldn't use this notebook without a sturdy cover system like the Roterfaden Taschenbegleiter. My biggest issue with this product is the price. $14.50 for an insert is...well, it's too much. It's good paper, and nicely bound, but it's also possible to find A5 notebooks that fit these specs for a third of that price. Buying these, especially in triplicate, as refills is not very cost effective. It's not a bad notebook, and if you like matching brands, it might be worth it, but it hasn't won me over.

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

---

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, for which I am very grateful.

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