Arigatô, Mr. Nagahara

Nagahara Nobuyoshi 1932-2015

In 1947 a 15 year-old boy went to work at the Sailor Pen Company in Hiroshima, Japan. He continued to work there for 64 years building a worldwide reputation as one of the finest fountain pen nib designers anywhere in the world. Nobuyoshi Nagahara, known as the “God of Fountain Pens” in Japan, passed away on March 11 of this year. This sad news came to me today with the arrival of Stationery Hobby Box (Shumi no bungu bako), issue 34. Following in the footsteps of his uncle and starting work as a boy in the Sailor factory, over the years he became a master craftsman of unparalleled genius, his reputation familiar to fountain pen aficionados all over the world. 

During my years of living in Japan I had several opportunities of meeting Mr. Nagahara at pen clinics and receiving advice about or adjustments to one or another of my several Sailor fountain pens. One might think it out of the question that such a respected craftsman would give ten or fifteen minutes of advice and help to lines of strangers, but that was Mr. Nagahara’s way at all of his clinics. I once asked if he would sign a page in the notebook I carried and with a laugh he took up my newly adjusted Sailor 1911, full of violet ink and dashed off his signature in the notebook.

Mr. Nagahara retired in 2011, leaving his son, Nagahara Yukio to take over his work at Sailor. In the true sense of traditional Japanese apprenticeship, there is little doubt that his 14 years of side-by-side work with his father guarantees that the Nagahara legacy is in good hands.

One of my favorite pens of Nagahara Nobuyoshi’s design is the susudake naginata in which the barrel and nib are encased in smoked bamboo. The process of smoking the bamboo over an open hearth is lengthy, sometimes carried over years at a time. The long absorption of smoke serves to harden the bamboo even more and to add elegant coloration to the grain. The result is called susudake, or smoked-stained bamboo. From this hard and beautifully colored bamboo, Mr. Nagahara made what is called the Susudake Naginata. The nib design is of 21k gold, long in body and slightly reminiscent of the old Japanese halberd or naginata.

Another Sailor favorite is the Sailor Profit 21 with its Naginata nib. What first caught my eye was the striking red and black body with gold trim, though it is not truly a red, more of an orangish red similar to persimmon—eyecatchingly beautiful in its elegant jet black, orangy-red and shiny gold trim. About the nib…One evening in Tokyo I was cleaning the pen and as will happen horribly on occasion, the pen slipped out of my hands and dropped like a missile, nib first to the hardwood floor. Any sharper and it would have stuck up quivering in the floor. I stood frozen in shock for half a minute imagining the newly blunted nib. No question it was badly damaged by the fall, and in a condition that required professional help. Three weeks later Mr. Nagahara was making an appearance at a pen clinic in Tokyo and I took the pen to him for repair. Apparently it was a simple fix for him, and within fifteen minutes he had the pen back to mint condition—and of course, no charge.

The article on Mr. Nagahara’s passing in Stationery Hobby Box suggests that for many, March 11, 2015 marked the end of an era.

Four Favorite Inks

It’s been some time since Scriblets has featured a post from the world of fountain pens and ink, and as a result the feeling of neglect is knocking about in my head. Easy to explain in some ways and daily habits do still include the use of one or more fountain pen and a whole assortment of inks. Most of my pens get a regular workout, and I’m often dithering over this or that ink to a degree many would call unreasonable. Still a passionate hobby, but one that has been affected in a large way by a change of scene.

It could be true that only a fountain pen hobbyist who has made the move from a major city to a very small and isolated town can understand the impact of change as far as fountain pens and inks are concerned. For many years my world was a heavenly realm of pens, ink, paper and fellow enthusiasts, Tokyo a paradise of stationery goods, an anytime avalanche of choices from basic to connoisseur. My little post-Tokyo beachtown in Florida is home to those for whom a Bic ballpoint and a giveaway memo pad are instrument enough for whatever needs jotting. And my guess is, you’d be confounded if you were shopping for a color other than black, blue or red. The inability to browse and experiment has had a negative influence on my love of pen and ink. Sure, there is a wide world of choices to look at and buy on hundreds of different websites, but my initiation was hands-on and looking at a digital image onscreen is nothing compared to holding it in my hand and giving it a try.

But still I scribble with my assortment of fountain pens, change ink for small reason, dabble with bottles of ink and Q-tips, read what I can to keep up with the game but purchase little outside of ink or paper from online stores. I can count on one hand the fountain pens I have purchased untested from online sources. Happily though, ink continues to be an easier and more trustworthy buy from distant vendors. Unless someone is badly screwing up the scans or photos of swab samples, ink is a safe bet without actually getting it on your fingers before purchase.

I have my favorites, though they change often enough to confound those on the outside, whose first question is always, “How will you ever use so much ink?” But for those on the inside, the question is hardly relevant. I have a bottle of Montblanc black ink purchased in Tokyo in 1985 which only improves with age; rather than using it up my concern is making it last. Ever changing, the three or four at the top of my list this month are shown below, all colors I use if not every day, then every other day. The case will probably be different in two or three weeks, but for now…

None of them new, and one unfortunately discontinued, these are the inks that color, stain, smear and highlight my journal pages these days. The oldest is the marvelous classic shade of gray-green from De Atramentis, Charles Dickens. Next is in my opinion an incomparable Turquoise from Montblanc, an ink no longer available and another I use carefully. Wine inks can be risky and shouldn’t be left too long in a fountain pen, but the Dornfelder from De Atramentis is one hard to deny. Nothing too special except it is a shade of red that appeals to me. The Diamine Denim is the newest and a very special shade of blue that instantly erases thoughts of ‘boring blue’ and hits the target dead on in terms of name and color. Seems like they stole the color straight out of the Levi Strauss dye pot.

The samples above (from top to bottom) were written with: (1) Pelikan Souverän 600 and De Atramentis Charles Dickens ink; (2) Sailor Profit with a Naginata nib and De Atramentis Dornfelder ink; (3) Montblanc Marcel Proust pen from the famous writers series and Montblanc’s Turquoise ink; (4) the wonderful Pelikano Junior with Diamine Denim ink.

All of the inks are available at Goulet Pens, where quality and service are unbeatable.

Seven Oranges

Prompted by Brian and Rachel Goulet’s October inkdrop from Goulet Pens, I went digging in my ink stacks pulling out some resonant oranges to line up beside their “Autumn Leaves II” October inkdrop palette. Pretty much a sucker for inks in the orange range, and with shades enough to satisfy any Halloween or Autumn theme I have probably wasted money on some I too rarely use. But addiction to ink being what it is, the phrase ‘waste of money’ doesn’t easily get through to me.

In one important characteristic, orange inks are like their distant cousins, the grays. For both colors to work well they must have good saturation, otherwise the words wash off the page and a reader will have to squint to read. No matter how beautiful an ink is in the bottle, or in a swab test, if it produces hard-to-read lines of writing, then you don’t have an ink that is very useful. I could name a half dozen orange inks that fail the test—I have a few bottles gathering dust—but for this comparison I left those inks out and lined up seven oranges that have rich saturation and are not difficult to read on the written page.

Another thing about the seven inks displayed here is that each one comes from a reputable company consistently producing quality inks. The range is broadly international, covering inks from the US, Switzerland, Germany, England and Japan.

A word about each…

The inks on the chart here are by no means listed 1-7 in any particular order of preference or quality. It is a totally random arrangement.

1. Private Reserve Orange Crush: I lied. Private Reserve’s Orange Crush is one of my longtime favorites that has as much to do with a childhood full of Orange Crush pop as it does with the richness of the color. This one is perhaps the most saturated of the seven and produces lines that can almost be called delicious.

2. Caran d’Ache Saffron: Similar to Diamine’s beautiful Pumpkin ink, this one too has the needed saturation, and a softness not seen in the Orange Crush. Part of the Earth Colors series from Caran d’Ache, it is a perfect fit, looking much like something squeezed from the earth.

3. De Atramentis Buonarroti Michelangelo: De Atramentis has long been a favorite ink maker and this one comes from Dr Jansen’s Historic Persons series. Very close to butterscotch and not terribly far from its Saffron neighbor, this ink definitely has a renaissance flavor, a color familiar in the works of Michelangelo.

4. Diamine Sunshine Yellow: Perfect name for a near golden yellow-orange. Sprinkle some orange zest beside this ink and it would be a match. This is one in the October inkdrop which arrived yesterday and there hasn’t been time yet to try it a pen, so I am trusting the saturation will be similar in a written sample.

5. Sailor Custom Mix Persimmon: Another ink that is always in one of my fountain pens, it was mixed by Osamu Ishimaru at a Tokyo pen clinic. I placed a persimmon on the table and asked him to match the color. No question he hit the bullseye. It is the color of late autumn persimmons hanging on trees in Japan.

6. Iroshizuku Fuyu-gaki (Winter Persimmon): No argument with Pilot and blenders of the Iroshizuku inks; they too have captured the essence of persimmons. My tiny complaint about the color is that it is closer to the color of the fruit in autumn and not winter. As the fruit ripens you will see more red.

7. Iroshizuku Yu-yake (Sunset): Another ink I like despite not using very often. That isn’t because of anything that bothers me specifically, except that it always looks better in a swab than it does in a letter, journal or notebook scribble. Saturation is fine and it has all the good qualities of Pilot ink.

For those with a penchant for orange, red-orange or yellow-orange inks, any of the above seven will do the trick and have your pens drunk on smoothness. Except for the De Atramentis Buonarroti Michelangelo they are all available at Goulet Pens, where the service is No. 1. If you are interested in the De Atramentis ink, it is available at Art Brown.

Another Sailor Package

Late in December of 2009, while browsing in a Tokyo pen shop I came upon a Sailor pen I hadn’t seen before. Had never even heard of a fountain pen with the name ‘Realo’ and couldn’t figure how anything made by Sailor had gotten past me—for two years. As I came to learn, commemorating its ninety-fifth year of making fountain pens, Sailor released a new design in 2007, one they called the Realo. I had trouble with the numbers, adding ninety-five to the founding year of 1911 and coming up with 2006. Strange math aside, I bought the Realo, excited about it before even leaving the shop.

Some research brought a better understanding of the name, one that really turns out to be both bland and odd. Hard to think we are supposed to put two and two together and realize that the name stands for 'reliance and place,’ or something like that. Problem is, no one will figure that out without a bit of hard looking. Pursue the question long enough and you will find that the first two letters ‘RE’ stand for ‘reliance,’ the third letter ‘A’ is for ‘and’ and the final ‘LO’ is (of course!) ‘locus.’ And so Sailor named a fountain pen a ‘word’ all Japanese people have difficulty pronouncing, tripped up by that pesky ‘L’ and calling it ‘Rearo.’

Whatever you want to call it, the Realo is one more in a line of quality writing instruments from Sailor. The key to this particular pen’s distinction is the naginata nib crafted by Nobuyoshi Nagahara, Sailor’s longtime nibmeister. It is a long, 21 carat gold nib, measuring very near 2.5 centimeters and called naginata after the tenth century Japanese halberd, or long handled sword.

Two features stand out in the Realo, both a first in Sailor design. This is the first Sailor pen to have a piston filler, and the first to have an ink window. The ink window feature is nothing unusual, and common to many fountain pens, but on the Realo it is a clear, easy to see window that doesn’t mislead. Too often ink windows are cloudy or stained and hard to see into; not so with the Realo’s window, which is perfectly clear and washes clean with each ink change. Size-wise, the pen weighs 35 grams, is 14 centimeters (5.5 inches) long closed and 15.5 centimeters (6.1 inches) posted. At a glance, the Realo looks very much like the early Sailor 1911, classic in shape and trim. The body is black acrylic resin and the pocket clip and bands are all 24k gold plate—a beautiful fountain pen.

Initially, the nib had very little flex (rare in a Sailor, unusual in a naginata) and even has H-B stamped on the side of the nib, which I suspect means ‘hard-broad.’ After a year and half of regular use the nib is no longer hard, but has just the right amount of flex. I don’t credit that to anything particular about Sailor nibs, but believe the same will happen with any nib, any pen used regularly over time. As for the B or broad part of it, that classification too is short of being altogether true. I am more comfortable calling it a generous M or medium. Whatever the ink, the pen never gripes or halts its flow across the page, each line testimony to what makes us like and enjoy using fountain pens. Odd name, great pen.

For some good close-up photos of the Realo take a look at what’s offered at Classic Fountain Pens.

Hobby Box Treasures

The latest issue of Stationery Hobby Box (Shumi no bungu bako) came out in Tokyo last March but I was unable to get a copy until recently. The fact that I did finally receive it is thanks to my always faithful friend K there in Tokyo. As I’ve said more than once, this is one of those magazines that spares nothing in its aim to produce a gorgeous magazine of over 150 glossy pages, filled with photographs, essays and presentations of new products in the world of paper, ink and fountain pens. Volume 19 immediately grabs the eye with its cover of light olive, red lettering and a close up of the issue’s showpiece, the recently released limited edition Sailor Shima Kuwa.

Eleven pages of the magazine are devoted to Sailor’s 100th anniversary and the release of two specially designed fountain pens to commemorate that milestone. One of the two is a pen made for a special few connoisseurs and far beyond the scope of what most can imagine owning. A few words about that fountain pen will follow a description of the pen shown on the magazine’s cover, the Shima Kuwa.

For its 100th anniversary Sailor released the exquisite Shima Kuwa, a limited edition of 1000 handcrafted fountain pens made from a rare mulberry wood. The wood is a premier grade of mulberry that comes from Mikurajima, a small island in the Izu archipelago famous for this rare natural material. The mulberry of Mikurajima is often used in making special gifts, known as the golden mulberry because of its natural golden grain. In Japan’s Edo era, this particular mulberry was considered precious and usable by only the most highly respected artisans called kuwamono-shi.

An even deeper beauty is coaxed from the mulberry using a deep burnishing process with urushi lacquer, one called fuki urushi that originated at the famous Jôhô Temple in Iwate Prefecture. Decoration is in the form of gold powder maki-e used to create a wave pattern on one side of the cap below the clip, while the alternate side bears the number, ‘100th.’ The lacquer work and the decoration were done by master maki-e artisan, Oshita Kôsen. The pen’s gold plate clip is a special design, an ‘anchor’ clip that echoes the longtime anchor emblem on many Sailor pens. Each pen is individually engraved with the serial number on the barrel end.

The Shima Kuwa comes with a large 21k nib plated with 24k gold. The Sailor anchor and chain are stamped on the nib. Perhaps a disappointment to some, the nib comes in only an M size. It uses a cartridge / converter filler. Dimensions are: length-162mm capped / uncapped-150mm; diameter-20.5mm; weight 36.8 grams. It is packed in a special Aizu-urushi lacquered gift box and comes with a silk pen wrap made in the ushikubi–tsumugi style, a traditional craft for 800 years. Also included is a bottle of black ink and five black cartridges. The top of the presentation box shows a maki-e decoration, a picture of Sailor’s original Hamada factory from 1911.

Sailor sells the pen for $1,958 and I feel certain that is the price at pen shops across Japan offering the Shima Kuwa. Classic Fountain Pens here in the US is offering the pen for $2000. Photographs of this very beautiful pen are excellent on that website.

If nothing else we can all dream about owning one.

Sailor’s second 100th Anniversary release is another limited edition of only 100 fountain pens, and one for those aficionados with deep pockets. It is the Arita Yaki Sometsuke-Kiri-Houou made of porcelain from the Imari area of Saga Prefecture. Arita-yaki (porcelain) has a tradition going back 400 years and is considered to be the origin of Japanese porcelain. The pure almost transparent blue and white is in a design immediately recognizable as Imari. Despite the porcelain’s thin smoothness it is strong, resistant to breaking and easy to care for.

The pen is made of Arita koransha porcelain, is 163.7mm long, 19.4mm in diameter and weighs a hefty 63 grams. Again, the nib is available only in M; the filling system is either cartridge or converter. It sells for $13,050.

Smoked Bamboo

A second look at the Sailor Susudake Naginata…

In the last few weeks of long years spent in Japan a process of winnowing began with the boxes, closets and shelves of things accumulated over time. Obvious that everything couldn’t be packed and shipped to Florida, but it was also obvious that some of those accumulations had achieved special value as tokens of memory, curious tidbits or in some cases an irreplaceable tool of daily life. There was enough to fill several boxes with hard to find objects of limited number, antique bits and pieces, each carrying an unmistakable imprint of Japan.

When it came to the packing of fountain pens, I counted nine Japanese pens, most of them Sailor. Each of the nine was treasured, used regularly and soon to be carefully wrapped and packed for shipping. But something was missing.

I found it a week later at Kingdom Note, a favorite pen shop in Shinjuku. Had someone asked before that what I was looking for, the answer would have been, “I’m not quite sure.”

The moment I saw the Sailor Susudake Naginata the answer came to me. It was a pen made by Japan’s ‘god of the fountain pen’ Nobuyoshi Nagahara, bearing the patented mark of traditional Japanese craft, smoked bamboo—a pen that would mark my time in Japan and my love of Japanese craftsmanship.

For centuries bamboo has been a common element in Japanese life, showing up in poetry, proverbs, chopsticks, body armor, sword guards as well as handles, writing brushes, and following the line of poetry and writing brushes, fountain pens. The wood is known for its strength and resilience as well as beauty, and for those reasons found its place among the objects of daily life.

But the bamboo is not merely cut and quickly fashioned into useful pieces. There is a lengthy process of smoking the bamboo over an open hearth, sometimes for years at a time. The rarest examples of susudake passed as much as a hundred years absorbing the smoke of generations. This long absorption of smoke serves to harden the bamboo even more and to add elegant coloration to the grain. The result is called susudake, or smoked-stained bamboo.

From this hard and beautifully colored bamboo, Sailor’s master nib craftsman has made what is called the Susudake Naginata. Naginata is a nib design of Mr Nagahara’s, long in body and slightly reminiscent of the old Japanese halberd or naginata. The nib is 21k gold, and as with other Sailor fountain pens is offered in a range of sizes from fine to broad. For those desiring other nib sizes, John Mottishaw at Classic Fountain Pens offers the pen with a nib in a wider range of sizes.

Before buying and using the Sailor Susudake I had had some experience with another of the Naginata pens and knew it qualities well, so risk on that account was zero. Like most of my pens, the Susudake has a medium nib with good flex. The flow of ink is smooth with never a hint of skip, always generous, never stingy. It is precisely the kind of nib and ink flow that Mr Nagahara is long famous for.

In the ultimate sense, pleasure from this fountain pen comes with its value as a kind of totem or relic of the Japan years. It has its time in the weekly pen rotation, but when not inked up and lounging on my writing desk it sits displayed on its own shelf, resting on the backs of two small silver cats.

The photograph with the sample writing was done with Iroshizuku Yama-guri ink in a Faber-Castell journal.

Interested in the earlier Susudake post? Look here.

Anchors Aweigh

Two fountain pens that have gotten frequent mention in Scriblets are the Sailor Professional Gear Silver and the Professional Gear Slim Gold, pens that in my estimation deserve more attention than is the case now in blogs devoted to fountain pens. Easy enough to call me a Sailor aficionado and not be far from the truth. Seven different Sailor pens lay about my desk, all used regularly, but the two most frequently used are the Professional Gear models pictured below. Dependable tools that are heavily used and never break down are what most of us call a ‘workhorse’ and Sailor fountain pens slip easily into that category.

In 1911, Kyugoro Sakata founded The Sailor Pen Company in Hiroshima, Japan. The engineering skills of Mr Sakata guided him and his company, and over the years the quality of Sailor fountain pens grew, as did the company’s reputation. Nothing in that statement has changed as far as quality and reputation are concerned. When you put your money down for a Sailor fountain pen high quality and long life are assured, or at least that has been my experience.

My first Sailor pen was the Professional Gear Slim Gold, purchased at a pen shop in Tokyo almost five years ago. From the moment I tested the pen in the shop there was a jackpot feeling about it. Not a large pen, it measures 4⁷⁄₈ inches capped and 5½ inches posted. The body design is traditional and made of black resin with gold plated trim. The 14k medium nib never falters, never skips, drips or dries out. It strikes me as just the kind of fountain pen any pen lover would cherish.

A couple of months after purchasing the Professional Gear Slim Gold I returned to the same pen shop and tested the larger big brother, the Professional Gear Silver. This one is 5¹⁄₁₆ inches capped and 5¾ inches posted, with a barrel diameter of a ½ inch. It has the same design as the smaller pen but with rhodium trim instead of gold. The medium nib is 21k with rhodium inlay. Writing quality? Like the smaller model, it never fails to lay down a smooth flow of ink, whatever the brand or color.

No one would tell you that Sailor fountain pens are cheap. Most of them retail at prices over $200, but there is comfort in the knowledge that you are getting a quality item that will last a lifetime. Surely something worth saving for.

Green Squiggles

The location of ink around here is for the time being haphazard. The Kugayama ink cabinet was something not shipped from Japan, and as a result there are now homeless ink bottles about, stacked in untidy rows on top of a chest. Staring at those bottles, I moved a few of them around, trying to put some order to the jumble. I’ve always been a sucker for green ink (among a half dozen other colors), so ended up with six bottles of green ink off to one side, the finalists chosen from a baker’s dozen of different greens.

I balked at the idea of filling six different pens to accommodate each of the greens, so divvied them up among pen, Q-tip, brush and folded paper. My purpose was to get a good, clean color sample, no more than a swatch of each color, and to leave out any observations about drying time, shading and such. I am happy enough offering just a simple color chart of green inks.

The attached scan may be difficult to read as far as the descriptions go. Here’s the order of colors and tools used; start at the top left and read across and down…

1. O-cha Green (Green Tea) • Sailor, order blend • scribbled with a pen

2. Racing Green • Montblanc • Q-tip

3. Conway Stewart Green • Conway Stewart • Brush

4. Frederick Chopin • De Atramentis • Folder paper

5. Shin-ryoku • Pilot Iroshizuku • Brush

6. Gin & Lime • Itô-ya Cocktail Ink • Q-tip

My favorite remains year after year the now discontinued Montblanc Racing Green. Some may find the bottom right, Gin & Lime a beautiful ink, and I would agree, but warn that it is a difficult color to read. Despite my fondness for the Iroshizuku inks, the Shin-ryoku comes off weakest in this line up. Always liked the Conway Stewart, but how can you not like that luscious blue-green. The Frederick Chopin is from the famous names series by De Atramentis, with a ‘pine green’ label attached to the ink. I like the heaviness of the green. I’ve saved Sailor’s O-cha Green for last, because it holds a special place in my nuttiness for ink. There is rarely a time when a pen loaded with this ink is not within my reach.

A Hardwood Grip

Today’s fountain pen spotlight focuses on a pen produced in such limited numbers, it may be unfamiliar to many aficionados, even those who name Sailor among their favorites. Mine is a recent gift from a good friend, someone I often refer to as my fountain pen sensei, or teacher.

Three years ago, in March of 2007, Sailor released a limited edition fountain pen crafted especially for the annual Mitsukoshi fountain pen clinic. The clinic is held each year for three days in March at their main store in Ginza. Each year Nobuyoshi Nagahara, Sailor’s living treasure nib-meister, makes an appearance, at the clinic. The model released at the 2007 clinic is one called the “Tagayasan,” written using the three characters in the photo. The name comes from the wood that the pen is crafted from, which in English is ironwood. I understand from my friend that only between twenty and thirty of these pens were produced.

The Sailor Tagayasan is handmade from one of the extremely hard woods we call ironwood. There are many varieties of ironwood, and which of those hardwoods Sailor chose to use has not been noted anywhere, to my knowledge. Though the wood grain is clearly visible in the dark brown wood, I thought at first that it was acrylic resin because of the several coats of lacquer applied to the wood. The hardwood is quite heavy, so the Tagayasan weighs slightly over thirty grams, only a shade under what the larger Pelikan Souverän 1000 weighs. Adding to the weight is a heavier than usual gold band at the base of the cap, which includes an extra beveled band below the usual one. In length, it is 13.5 cm with cap, and 15.5 cm posted.

As with all Sailor fountain pens, the nib is what it’s all about. The Tagayasan comes with Nobuyoshi Nagahara’s long-proven Naginata Togi nib. Mine is a little unusual when compared to my other Naginata nibbed pens, this one surprisingly hard and inflexible. It is a medium, 21k iridium tipped nib, and at first I thought it odd, or out of whack because of the stiffness. It took several pages of writing to show me that it is simply an inflexible nib, and despite my preferences for more flex, there is nothing about it to detract from the elegant line of ink it lays down. I have a feeling that over the months of regular use, it will develop a measure of flexibility.

The writing sample in the photo here was done with Ajisai (hydrangea) ink, from the Iroshizuku series.

From Blah to Bloom

Tokyo definitely not at its best on this Saturday of colorless, overcast skies, intermittent flurries of snow and freezing rain. Altogether a cheerless and dispiriting day, the kind when a brightening boost is needed to turn the mind and the eyes away from morose thoughts and murky views. To help in that department I have cheated a little on the date and call this Saturday, the 13th my Fun Ink Day. And to make it even better, I’ve spent an hour or so sprawled on my sofa idling through the pages of a typeface and font book.

Pocket Blonde’s blog post for Friday, the 12th alerted me to the delightful idea that the day had been declared Fun Ink Day, with a link to the Cincinnati blogger whose idea it was. I can’t see any reason why it has to be Friday, February 12 only, so if you missed it, go ahead and get crazy with ink on another day. I did, and often do.

In addition to the ink, I followed a link on Everyday Correspondence with its weekly list of Friday Night Favorite Reads, and lost myself for a while in the The Oscars of Type recommendation. That prompted me to drag out a book, look through pages of typeface and think about some of my own favorite and often used fonts.

Fun Ink Day and The Oscars of Type were a great recipe for turning my cheerless day in one made happy with ink and typefaces.

I doubt that anyone could accuse me of being unadventurous in my choice of what ink to use, and hardly a day passes that I don’t write something in at least three different non-standard, business-ready inks. There’s always a pen with black, dark brown or blue ink on my desk, but I also alternate filling several fountain pens with ‘fun’ or ‘statement’ inks for a variety of uses. The three colors I have used today are shown in the photo here, but I’ll try to be more specific about each one.

The top ink is a Sailor Jentle Ink custom mix called ‘Green Tea’ which this week is in my large yellow Sailor 1911. I used it this morning to write a page in my journal, because the color felt right for my mood and my thoughts. The middle ink is Visconti’s ‘Bordeaux,’ relatively new to my ink shelves, and these days the favorite among my wine inks. I had some pages to edit today, and the Visconti was a good choice, standing out well against the pencil written pages I was working on. The pen used is another Sailor, this one a Professional Gear. The bottom ink is one in the Pilot Iroshizuku series, ‘Fuyu Gaki (Winter Persimmon) in a Lamy Safari. Didn’t do much with this one today, but had to leave a short note for someone, and the orange ink was perfect for the subject of that note. I also knew that the person reading the note would like the color.

The Oscars of Type link introduced twelve fonts chosen as The Best… I thought that was a great idea, but was unfamiliar with the winners. So I got the idea of looking through the mile long list of fonts on my iMac and picking out the five that I most enjoy using, and use frequently. I doubt that any are candidates for an typeface Oscar, but at least two of them (first & fourth from the top) are highly respected fonts. From the top, the five fonts I like are: Bembo Italic, Borg 9, Budmo Jiggler, Eaglefeather Regular Italic and Herculanum.

Thanks to Fun Ink Day and The Oscars of Type, a colorless day became brighter.