St. Louis Pen Show (Sponsor)

My thanks to the St. Louis Pen Show for sponsoring The Pen Addict this week.

From Thursday, June, 22nd to Sunday June, 25th, the pen world heads to the Gateway City. Have you made plans yet? If so, great! If not, here is a sampling of what you have to look forward to:

• Over 170 vendor tables.
• Around 20 classes over the three public days, featuring calligraphy, cursive handwriting, journaling, letterpress, vintage pens, Pen Repairs, and others.
• KWZ Missourah Crawdad! Your first chance to pick up this show exclusive ink.
• Low admissions rates at $5 for a single day pass, $10 for all three public days, and $30 for the four day trader pass.
• Great hotel rates, which include breakfast daily.
• Tons of door prizes throughout the weekend.

Time to make plans to meet your friends in St. Louis! Head over to the St. Louis Pen Show website for all of the details, buy tickets, and book your hotel for the pen show rate, which always sells out.

Six Years and Counting!

(Kimberly (she/her) took the express train down the fountain pen/stationery rabbit hole and doesn't want to be rescued. She can be found on Instagram @allthehobbies because there really are many, many hobbies!.)

Before I get started, I just wanted to say thank you to folks who were so kind about my article last week on family memory loss/dementia. It really means a lot to me.

The end of May has marked my penversary for the past 6 years and I wasn’t really in a good head space to celebrate it last week but I’m much better this week, so I can now say “Holy cow! How can it be that I have now been in this rabbit hole for 6 years!” Time to celebrate, right?!

You may recall that last year, I had a bit of trouble trying to figure out what my 5 year penversary pen should be. When the Platinum 3776 Shape of Heart was announced last spring, I knew that would be the perfect penversary pen! But, it turned out, it wouldn’t be available for several months. And by the time it got to the states, I had put it on the back burner and sort of forgot about it.

Since I didn’t get around to getting one when it came out, it became harder and harder to find. For some reason, it was sold out everywhere! I checked ebay, international vendors, Japan, and even the US distributor Luxury Brands of America didn’t have any more. Nooooo!!!! But wait! A pen friend found one for me!! Hallelujah! (Of course, I have since seen the pen for sale multiple times, but that’s just how it goes, I guess!)

I won’t go into a full blown pen review of Platinum 3776s since it has been reviewed by many folks already. I think they are beautiful pens and I love how they write (the Medium nib is just perfect for me), but this one is special. Platinum stamps out a heart-shaped breather hole in their nibs and subsequently recycles & melts the punched out hearts to make more nibs. For the Shape of Heart pen, however, they take the heart cut-out and put it inside the crystal-filled finial!

Heart-shaped breather hole that’s cut out of the Platinum nib (and Nakaya too!)

Look at the heart!

The little heart in the cap finial really embodies the love I feel for pens, this hobby and this community. I inked up this pen with Colorverse Brunch Date partly because of the matchy match and everything about this combo makes my heart warm. Yes, Platinum and Colorverse always reminds me of my friends at Luxury Brands of America who distribute both brands, but the Colorverse Brunch Date ink from Smruti Pens also reminds me of my conversations with owner Akhila Sheth about Instagram’s frustrating algorithms, parenting and pen shows. It also represents the friendships I’ve made, both online and in real life - penabling people, being penabled, sharing, learning, playing with inks and pens over meals, at the bar, cafe, coffee tables, stationery shops, and of course, I will always think of my friend who remembered I was looking for this pen and helped me buy it when they saw it.

Writing sample of the Platinum 3776 Shape of Heart, Medium nib with Colorverse Brunch Date on 90 gsm Clairefontaine Triomphe.

I am still in shock that I have found a hobby that I’ve embraced this tightly for this long and that I’m still loving every minute of it! Yes, the pens and things are wonderful and all, but it’s really about being a part of this community that keeps me coming back for more! I love spending time on Slack, Instagram, Facebook, Discord, Zoom, and traveling to pen shows and meetups so I can hang out with pen friends old and new. So whether or not I’ve met you, I want to thank you for being a part of this rabbit hole and for making the past 6 years such a blast! Onwards to the next 6 years and beyond!

Shibui Pocket Pen 12-Pen Case 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. And check out her latest book, Out of Water, now available where books are sold!)

As an avid pocket pen user, I was excited to try the Shibui Pocket Pen 12-Pen Case in hopes it would help transport my mini pens in style. My usual pen sleeves are too long to conveniently carry my pocket pens, and I always have at least a few pocket pens inked, so I was hoping for a gamechanger. I found this case to be a mix of excellent innovative design, and some design decisions that ultimately didn't work for me, but might for you.

The case is made from high-quality, full-grain leather. It is very well stitched, everything lines up nicely, and it's sturdy and protective without being too heavy or inflexible. The zippers are metal and pull smoothly, even around the corners of the case.

The best feature of this case is the trademarked Pull-Tag that allows the user to adjust the tension of each pen loop so that the case can accommodate pens of any circumference. Since I have pocket pens that range from a slim Kaweco Liliput to a chonky Pen BBS, that's an amazingly useful feature. It also allows clip-less pens to be cinched in snug and sound, so the case will work for a variety of styles.

The case holds 12 pens, with six inside each side of the clamshell opening and a padded, soft divider between them. The divider is velvety on one side, and has six card slots on the other. Personally, I'd rather have the velvet on both sides. I don't quite understand the need for pockets in this case, unless you want to carry the ink swatch cards for your currently inked pens. I can see the use case for that, though it's not something I do. Whatever is in those pockets will be touching the pens on that side.

Ultimately, for me, this case works better for storage than carry. That's because I don't carry a dozen pocket pens at once. If I'm carrying a pocket pen, it's usually just one or two, and I've picked them because I'm going for a minimal carry or a light load. It would be good for bringing a collection to a pen show, so it may be the perfect thing if you visit a lot of shows. It's also worth noting that it can fit shorter standard pens. A full-size TWSBI was too long, but it would fit most pens smaller than that.

While I don't find myself carrying this case, I think I'd use something similar in a two-pen design. I will definitely use this one for storage, though, and I don't hesitate to recommend it if you're hauling a lot of wee pens around. The case is currently priced at $85, which is fair considering the design, materials, and construction. I often try to guess the price of something before I look, and this was half the cost I expected. I think my pens will be very happy in this case while they nap between uses.

(Goldspot 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!