Seconds

I might have mentioned this before: my father was a joiner and this meant that he used a lot of pencils – and because he used so many my mother tried, if possible, to get cheap pencils. This pencil was one of these. I saw it last time I visited her in Germany and took it back with me, along with a few other pens I will write about another time.

Click for full size

 

When you look at it you realise that it is from a time when pencils were less of a commodity and more of something the manufacturer was proud of. This specific specimen must have been deemed to be of so poor quality that the logo was sanded out and that it was stamped “SECONDS”.

"SECONDS"

 

Needless to say that there is nothing really wrong with this pencil and that it is miles better than the no name pencils you get in many supermarkets. It is just from a time long gone, when there were more manufacturers who were proud of their products and more consumers who paid what the products were worth.

The logo has been sanded out

 

Birds in our garden (2)

A male blackbird feeding a fledgling, photographed by my wife.

One of the blackbirds even knows how to let us know that they want more food on the bird table: if there is no food left he will fly to the roof of the bird table, land and then fly towards us when we are near the window or in the garden.

Faber-Castell Videos

In their anniversary year Faber-Castell have been featured in a regional, Franconian television programme. The good news: you can watch these videos outside Germany. The bad news: the videos are in German and there are no English subtitles.

The GvFC Perfect Pencil I always carry in the pocket of my jacket.

 

This short video shows the factory and includes a few scenes showing how Faber-Castell tests the pencils for poisonous and unwanted components to make sure they are absolutely safe. If you like Lexikaliker’s museum posts you will be delighted to see some old catalogues and products in the video, too …and even our favourite count, Count Anton Wolfgang von Faber-Castell makes an appearance1.

Another video, similar to Lexikaliker’s old Staedtler video, gives a glimpse of pencil manufacturing 100 years ago. There is also a radio report about pencil manufacturing. The radio report mentions how Lothar Faber became a member of the aristocracy and why the name changed from Faber to Faber-Castell.

  1. I wonder whether his family got invited to the royal wedding. His niece is married to a relative of Prince Philip. [↩]

Pelikan in the news

In the past few days Pelikan has been in the (financial) news. Last year their turnover dropped by 13% and they lost more then ten million Swiss francs.

There have been quite a few changes for Pelikan in the past months: As mentioned previously they now manufacture the Porsche Design pens, but they stopped distributing certain Henkel products – Staedtler does that now  …no wonder Staedtler’s glue in the Pencilmaker Set is from Henkel.

I hope Pelikan’s financial situation will improve again. It certainly wasn’t my fault – I bought quite a few Pelikan products (mainly fountain pens).

Continuing the Pelikan theme: you might remember one of my previous blog posts that included a video of Japanese politicians using a Pelikan. Well,something similar might happen in New Zealand soon: politicians there use Pelikan fountain pens, too. Simon Parker, New Zealand’s Minister of Justice, Minister for State Owned Enterprises, Minister of Commerce, Minister Responsible for the Law Commission and Associate Minister of Finance received a Pelikan fountain pen as a gift from the German State Secretary.

What stationery taught me about Oceania:  Australian pencils are harder than British pencils and New Zealand’s politicians hold more ministerial posts than British politicians.

Nautical Stationery Set

Today: a blog post with images all over the place.

This weekend’s 56th annual Eurovision Song Contest is over. With an estimated 125 Million viewers watching it is a big event, but even though it is quite big in Europe not many people outside Europe1 would probably know about it2. Nevertheless, the contest even seems to inspire politicians: a few years ago Putin proposed a similar Asiavision Song Contest.

While watching the final this weekend I was kind of expecting that Jimmy Jump would invade the stage again – like during last year’s Eurovision final and during the Football world cup final – but there was no sight of him…

Moldova’s entry was funny-ish, but I thought it was nowhere near as good as the (kind of) similar entry  from the Ukraine in 2007. It also somehow reminded me of a Knorkator song that made it into the German national finals in 2000. …and a last comment before I stop writing about Eurovision: what a shame that Switzerland did not get more votes. I thought their song was really nice (even though the singer should not have moved her arm so much).

Düller notepads

John Lewis Door Stop

Other things I did this weekend, except watching the Eurovision Song Contest,  included going to Manchester’s Trafford Centre. In John Lewis I saw a pencil shaped door stop for £25 (~$40; ~€29), but even more interesting than this was Pedlars in Selfridges. They sold Düller memo pads, including the long version featured in pencil talk’s recent Düller Memo Pad post …but unfortunately, they did not have the dotted version in stock. When I was in Pedlars a few weeks ago they still sold the Düller mechanical pencil that comes “in” a note pad, but this time only the sample was left (which is probably not for sale and was slightly damaged).

Oops - Upside down

Ships!

I bought a nautical stationery set by SORT, The Society Of Revisionist Typographers, despite the name obviously a company, not a society. When I bought it I didn’t know yet, but a quick search on the Internet revealed that this set was featured in a UK newspaper’s 2009 Christmas gift guide. I am not so keen on the nautical theme, but the paper and printing were nice enough to convince me to buy this stationery set.

Something else I discovered this weekend, this time in Homesense in Preston: nice leather bound notebooks from Gallery Leather, printed in Korea (so I assume the paper is Korean, too) and bound in Maine, USA. All the journals I looked were very well made and at around £8 (~$13; ~€9) they were also very reasonably priced. I assume you can also find them at T.K. Maxx / T. J. Maxx, since they belong to the same company.

 

  1. …or better: outside the “European Broadcasting Area”, which includes many non-European countries, that participate in the contest [↩]
  2. Australia might be an exception. Not only is it shown there, viewers can even vote, even though their vote does not count. [↩]

Kronenheft

Kronenheft, Morning Glory pencils (with point protectors) and Noodler’s X-Feather ink

Back from Germany, I am going to try another four-in-one blog post. I did not take part in the Faber-Castell factory tour mentioned in one of the previous comments because of a bereavement – which resulted in a very different trip than planned. I hope to take part in one of their factory tours in December and hope to find the time to visit Staedtler’s shop in Nuremberg, too.

This is going to be a four-in-one blog post because I want to speed things up as there are so many things I want to write about but I do not write enough blog posts – so the queue gets longer and longer. The low number1 of comments on the previous four-in-one blog post about the Black n’ Red polynote does however make me think that writing about multiple items in one blog post does not give each individual item the attention it deserves, so I might switch back to one or two items per post…

…but today another (the last?) many-in-one blog post.

Kronenheft

The Kronenheft must be one of the most understated notepads available. I bought mine at Antiquariat Daniel Osthoff in August 2010. I mentioned this shop and some of the papers they sell in my blog post about the OHTO Super Clip. The Kronenheft notepad has been on the market for many years and is distributed by Carta Pura. It measures 15 cm x 10 cm and features a 290 g/m² Preßspanersatzkarton cover, an “imitation particle board” traditionally used, amongst other things, for book covers. It is a sturdy material made from wood pulp. The paper of this pad is 80 g/m² Salzer Werkdruck paper from Austrian paper manufacturer Salzer. Even though paper has been manufactured in Salzer’s town since 1469 and at the their mill, Obere Papiermühle, since 1579, the history of Salzer is slightly younger as the founder Kaspar Salzer did not have his own paper mill until 1798. Even though the 80 g/m² Salzer Werkdruck paper is not their best paper it is very good with a great feel and texture and a slightly creme-coloured tint.

Carta Pura, the distributor, sells this notepad in twelve different colours for € 7 each. You can also get a refill (40 sheets) for € 3. I paid less, but I am not sure how much exactly. FontShop used to sell them for a good price, but when I check recently I could not find it in their online shop any more.

The crown (German: Krone) in the Kronenheft

Morning Glory

This is the second appearance of a Morning Glory pencil at Bleistift. The first appearance was last month, when I wrote about RAD AND HUNGRY’s STMT X Korea kit. This time I used a much older Morning Glory pencil that my wife bought about ten years ago, the morning glory No. 33322-45229 HB. You would think that such a long product number can definitely point to one specific type of pencil, but there are actually different versions of the morning glory No. 33322-45229 HB pencil, with different colours printed on the pencil, but with the same product number.

The pencil itself writes very well. It could be a bit smoother, but it is by no means a scratchy pencil.

Pelikan M100

Since today is Star Wars day (May the Fourth be with you) I have to include the Pelikan M100, too. I cannot look at this pen without thinking of Stormtroopers and am convinced that if Stormtroopers had fountain pens  this Pelikan M100 would be standard issue! It is a great fountain pen and all of its parts are either white or black, even the nib is black. The piston mechanism does not feel as smooth as it does with a Pelikan M200 or a Souverän, but when this fountain pen was released in 1987 it was not an expensive pen so it is no surprise that the piston mechanism is not on the same level. The nib however is excellent for a steel nib and is quite flexible, too.

If Stormtroopers had fountain pens this Pelikan M100 would be standard issue. Here you can see the M100 camouflaged between other black and white items.

Noodler’s X-Feather ink

The ink used in the M100 is Noodler’s X-Feather ink, a black ink that is bulletproof, i.e. resistant to bleach, chemicals, light, etc. I have used this ink for years and am very happy with it. There is only one disadvantage I noticed. If you use it in a wet writer and use paper that does not absorb ink easily (e.g. post cards) it can happen that a layer on top of the ink does not ‘dry’ completely. In this case it can smudge or smear, even days after the text has been written. Under normal circumstances this is however not really a problem.

Conclusion

The Kronenheft is just great, but with its price tag I am not sure I will use it often. It copes well with ink (no bleeding though) and pencil and has a nice colour and texture.

You can find another photo of the Kronenheft in my previous blog post Wooden Letter Rack with Draw.

You can find English blog posts about Carta Pura at bloesem travel and at snowflakes & blackvampires.

Noodler’s X-Feather ink has also been used in my previous blog post Carrefour Bloc-notes.

I’d like to thank Ms Schwamborn from Carta Pura for additional information about the Kronenheft.

In case you wonder where my Cherry G80-3000LSC went: the photos show my wife’s desk, which is very similar – except the keyboard.

  1. i.e. one [↩]