Fountain Pen Day 2024

The Orlando Pen Club had a meetup today for the annual Fountain Pen Day (Nov 1st), and I drove down to attend. I’d talked to a few of the members online, but this was my first meeting.

There was around thirty people there, I think. Everyone was kind and welcoming. There were lots of new people there besides me. The group was delightfully diverse — a range of ages, genders, races, etc. I got to try out lots of pens. Here are my notes on them.

In order:

— Narwal (Navhular) Original Plus, M nib: Nice enough for an inexpensive demonstrator.

— Pelikan Souveran m800 in “green apple”, M nib: Felt good in the hand, but somewhat dry. I liked it okay, but not enough to pay multiple hundreds of dollars for it (even if I had the money).

— Pelikan m1000, B nib: Holy fuck that thing was massive. You could almost use it as a sex toy, it’s so big. No thank you.

— Pilot Custom 823, F nib: I fell madly in love with this pen. It’s going on my wish list.

— Pilot Custom 92, B nib: Liked it, but not as much as the 823.

— Pelikan m605, M nib: meh.

— Fourth Kind Pens, ebonite and makarta (no idea how to spell that), 1.4mm stub nib: Weirdest-looking pen I’ve ever laid eyes on. Looks like a vaguely pen-shaped rock. I was told by its owner that stub nibs are very dry. I didn’t like it. The nib, I mean. So freaky-looking.

— Platinum 3776, music nib: I would happily own this, though I’m not sure I would spend the money. It makes my handwriting look cool. I might get the pen with a different nib though. Felt nice in my hand.

— Jinhao 1909 with custom urushi, triple-stacked architect nib: the owner said he’d turned this $10 pen into a $450 one. There’s a guy in Japan who does urushi on cheap (under $50) pens only. So it got a $100 urushi treatment and a $350 specialty nib. I have decided its owner, one of the pen club’s founders, is freaking nuts, but in a good way. (He’s really nice. But that pen is fucking weird.)

I also got to try Midori paper (fairly nice stuff that’s thin but has minimal ghosting) and the new Tomoe River (did not like). Lighthouse Papers donated a bunch for the meetup to try out.

One of the other founders and I struck up a friendship, I think. She even offered to drive up to hang out sometime. Her mom is a weaver, and I gave her the info to join the Weavers of Orlando guild. She greeted me like an old friend and was wonderful to chat with.

I only stayed 1.5 hours, because my brain won’t let me socialize for more than that, but it was very worth the drive down and I hope to attend meetings occasionally in the future. I’m so glad I went!