Paper

The joy of paper

This morning, Musubi, a small Singapore-based notebook maker, published a note informing its customers about the end of the road for Cosmo Air, a type of paper popular with aficionados of fountain pens.

I am one of those, who revels in the sound, feel, and sensation of a beautiful nib laying ink as it scratches (or dances) on the paper. In this note, one paragraph stood out and summed up what makes paper so special.

Paper is an analog product, made by analog processes, and everything, from the composition of the pulp, to the water that runs through it, to the machinery that is used, has an impact on how that paper feels and writes. It’s the joy inherent to something physical, and simultaneously its Achilles heel.

Technology has taught me – change is unavoidable. Embrace it. I might miss the Cosmo Air paper, but I won’t be despondent. Something

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Happy Fountain Pen Day

Today is “the first Friday in November,” which is officially Fountain Pen Day. As we fountain pen nerds like to call it, the idea of FPD started in 2012 to celebrate fountain pens. I have often written about the benefits of writing with a pen or a pencil, but for me, nothing beats a fountain pen. If you have never had the pleasure of writing with a fountain pen, then today might be a good day to start your journey into a slow, deliberate, and organic approach to writing.

In a previous post, I explained why:

Computers have a unique way of making us writers a bit mentally lazy — indulging in a stream of consciousness writing. One doesn’t take the extra few minutes to think about what one is going to write or think about the missing pieces and how they all fit together It is, perhaps, because, we

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Why Pen + Paper are good for you

Even though I love technology and incessantly download productivity apps, I still am a paper-and-pen guy. I love the feel of fine artisanal Japanese paper notebooks and extra-fine nibs of my Sailor fountain pen. I draft my weekly newsletter in the note book. I use it to make my to-do lists, and I write all sorts of random things I learn during the day. Of course, I make notes of my meetings in my notebook — which sits with one or more fountain pens, along with my glasses and a Kindle, in my Dsptch Musette.

My paper and pen obsession has many upsides, as a recent article in Fast Company outlines:

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A rapidly growing city of Paperholm(s)

paperholm

Tumblr is a wonderful place — you just don’t know what you are going to stumble into! A few weeks ago, I ended up on Paperholm, a website where Edinburgh-based architect/artist Charles Young has been sharing photos of miniature homes he has been creating out of paper. Since August 2014, he has shared multiple creations – each intricate, beautiful and nearly perfect. Obsessed with these paper homes, I cold emailed Young wondering what got him started. “The project started as a way of keeping myself making work,” he replied. “By having to produce something every day you’re forced to be creative and productive.”

I couldn’t agree more with him — I have slowly started to blog everyday and it has forced me to once again feel creative and productive. Of course, I struggle with my inability to find time to write and have been reconfiguring my life to incorporate writing, my new love photography and

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On writing with fountain pens

Computers have a unique way of making us writers a bit mentally lazy — indulging in a stream of consciousness writing. One doesn’t take the extra few minutes to think about what one is going to write or think about the missing pieces and how they all fit together It is, perhaps, because, we can cut, paste and modify with relative ease. We are constantly in “draft” mode and any addition and subtraction of words is nothing more than a mere act of readjustment. 

In comparison, writing with a fountain pen brings a different kind of rigor — forcing you to slow down, think, visualize and compose the story before committing it to paper. I still am trying to get comfortable with the idea of writing with ink on paper. Even in early going, I find myself becoming measured and careful about what I want to say. Cutting and pasting,

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What I am reading today

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