Paper Like Cream

Several days before leaving Tokyo I had lunch with a friend at Tokyo Midtown, one of Tokyo’s more posh developments in the Roppongi district, and later wandered into the Faber Castell store. This is not a place to shop when economizing is on your mind, since it is loaded with very expensive pens, pencils and other high quality stationery goods.

I tried one of the fountain pens and liked everything but the price, sampled the two available inks, black and blue, then came across a small selection of blank journals in three different sizes. These journals were right up my alley and I didn’t hesitate to buy one in the A6 size (8.27 inches x 5.83). Such an elegant looking book!

It is covered in a creamy beige linen, with GRAF VON FABER-CASTELL and a small Faber-Castell coat of arms in dark gray. The pages are blank, cream-colored and of thick, smooth paper, perhaps a degree or two shy of Clairefontaine. The touch or feel is like the color, creamy. I tried four different fountain pens and inks, each one gliding across the page with the smoothness of half-melted butter. Anyone who has read a few pages of the Scriblets blog will likely know how much I like the Japanese Life Noble Note journals, but I will quickly concede that the Faber-Castell paper is superior. Zero feathering, and because the paper is so thick, bleed through is very slight, even with a hefty medium nib and a particularly wet ink (Athena Sepia).

I spent close to an hour online trying to find a place other than Tokyo Midtown that carries these notebook-journals. Sort of like looking for a needle in a haystack. No luck, I’m afraid.

Today was my first full day in Florida, and both productive and pleasant. If nothing else, the warm and dry weather was a welcome change from this year’s odd spring in Tokyo. But I was yearning for my sunglasses most of the time. Enjoyed some time browsing in Borders; bought a 2010 reprinting of Natalie Goldberg’s 1986 book, Writing Down the Bones.