Paper Love IV: X47 MaBook Notebook

Okay, the title is a little misleading for it's more like "leather love" but that just sounded wrong. :-D The X47 MaBook is a modular planner/notebook system not unlike a rather sophisticated Midori Traveler's Notebook. A range of refills is provided by X47, mainly diaries but also notebook inserts with plain or ruled pages. That's about the point where the similarities end!

As I was interested in this book X47 have offered a discount for a review. Thank you, X47! Still trying to be as neutral as possible reviewing this great piece of craftsmanship.

X47 MaBook notebook

X47 products aren't aimed at the youthful traveler but rather the distinguished businessman. Being neither of these I still like both systems and appreciate the variety. The MaBook immediately gives the impression of being extremely well made. The books are sewn by hand here in Germany using fine calfskin. The leather has a glossy surface which doesn't show minor scratches and also should be pretty immune to stains and discoloring. It should keep its pristine look for many years - no patina intended. Still - and very importantly at least to me - there is no plasticky feel to the surface and at the spine or the pen loop you can feel the leather is soft and supple.

The front and back cover seem to have some sort of stiff inlay so the book provides a hard surface to write on even if it's just resting on your legs. Let's look inside!

 X47 MaBook notebook - inside the front cover 

This is the inside of the front cover. There is room to insert an additional A6 notebook which is really neat. The one I'm using right now is slightly smaller than A6 (but it has Tomoe River paper! :D)

I'm not sure what the thing above the notebook space is for. It's a stamp sized opening with a leather flap which you can pull out. I've tried to imagine some use for this but can't really find one. Storing passport photographs maybe? Someone definitely put some thought into this so I'd like to find out. Let me know if you have any ideas!

X47 MaBook notebook - the lower end of the spine and beautiful ribbon bookmarks.

It's plain that there are no Midori-like rubber bands here. Also there's apparently nothing going through the middle of the refill notebooks. So how do you put a refill in there?

The answer lies within these slim metal rods. The curvy parts belong to the MaBook covers. The straight parts can be taken out and have two thorns which go through the spine of the refill. The ready made refills provided by X47 already have a rod attached to them so exchanging them is quick and convenient. They're also not hard to "hack". Remove the rod from the original refill and attach it to any cahier you'd like. All you need to do is punch two small holes into the spines at the right location.

My MaBook now houses a Midori MD light, a Rhodia and a Semikolon cahier. A fourth notebook could be added but as the Rhodia is pretty thick I'll stick with three for the moment.

X47 MaBook notebook - inserts are held by slim  metal rods

Here's the metal rod holding the Midori MD notebook in place next to one not holding a refill. The system is nice because it takes very little space inside the MaBook, much less than rings, and of course looks more elegant than rubber bands. On the other hand it's an additional effort if you want to use your own refills.

As you can see above there are three differently colored ribbon bookmarks sewn into the spine. The ends of those seem to be dipped in resin or glue, they are a little stiff and won't unravel for a long time. Another one of these well thought out and beautiful details.

The X47 MaBook notebook is full of nice details.

There's also a pen loop large enough to hold fountain pens. These last pictures show the color best (the light wasn't too great when I took them), a deep chestnut brown. They also come in black and red with various finishes, even crocodile print if you're into that.

The inside of the back cover has additional room for some business cards. X47 have told me there is already a new generation of the MaBook with extra space for some sticky notes but I'm just as happy with the old one. They come in A5 and A6 size, mine being the A5 one. It weighs 570 grams with 3 refills. The manufacturer can be found here: X47

How do you like the MaBook? I have to say I feel a little intimidated by it sometimes as it's such a nice piece of work and I feel like I'd need to become some bigwig CEO to use one. However the book still appears slim and subtle and unobtrusive enough to use in any daily context - even if you, like me, don't plan ever to be a bigwig of any kind.

Small Scale DIY: simple handmade notebook

Crafting has never been quite my thing. I'm acting too much on impulse and too little on careful planning to get really nice results. My crafted things always are a bit sloppy and come with a whole bunch of imperfections. I still like most of them.

I made this notebook as a refill for my leather journals - find out more about those here - and to give the 500 sheet ream of Neusiedler Japan Post which arrived at my doorstep lately some perspective of ever being used up.

Japan Post is awesome by the way, mine is the 80 g/sqm weight which is still amazingly fountain pen friendly, with a tiny bit of tooth and a pretty watermark. It's made in Austria and should be widely available in Europe. It only comes in white.

For the notebook I took about 30 sheets of Japan post. Before folding them I made sure to arrange the sheets so the watermark wouldn't always be on the same side. This way I wouldn't have one half of the notebook without any watermarked pages and the other half full of those. It may sound silly, but I like it that way. ;)

For the cover I used a leaf from a wall calender and covered it with some Washi paper which I had decorated with watercolor sprinklings. If you soak the paper first, the color sprinkles will spread nicely. I really like the soft and romantic shades of the watercolors on this paper.

As the cover looked a little too plain by itself I added a ready made label.

After everything was ready I folded sheets and cover - it worked better for me to fold the sheets in small portions, then put them together as opposed to folding the whole wad at once - then punched 4 holes into the spine with hammer and nail and threaded some thick sewing yarn through them. Feels nice and secure and should hold up until the notebook is full and hopefully for some time afterwards.

Ready to write! I really like beautiful watermarks.

The next notebook might get some nice grid printed on the pages. The only problem is I found that some laser printers seem to make paper extra slick and less enjoyable with fountain pens.

Pictures also starring a Caran d'Ache Leman in pink of which I will show some more pictures in due course!

Have you ever made your own notebook? What are your experiences? What did you like most about them?

Montblanc Agatha Christie - Agatha the Brave

DiY pen stuff

... well, in fact it was me who needed the bravery more than Agatha. All she had to do was come with slightly misaligned tines. Not a big deal, it wasn't even very noticeable when writing but once I had seen the flaw I could no longer forget about it. 

When you do some reading, things like that even seem to be fixable by yourself. Small irregularities can be put right by gently bending the tines with your fingernails, you don't even need tools or anything. 

As simple as that sounds it took me many attempts of gently bending stuff with no effect whatsoever, which I guess is what happens if you are too gentle with anything. In the past I've always given up at some point and sent the pen to a repairman but I wasn't feeling like that this time. Also I got lots of encouragement from the enablers at the German pen forum Penexchange.

So, with my heart in my mouth, I spent several hours with Agatha and indeed, I'm starting to get there!

Montblanc Agatha Christie in nearly no light (would've loved some more depth of fiel here...) and with nearly well aligned tines.

Since I made thie picture I've fiddled with the nib some more because it wasn't perfect yet and I could still improve it by a fair bit. And since my fingers were inky all over already I figured I could fiddle with some more nibs that had given me trouble, all of which ended up being better than where I'd started out.

Discovering new abilities (however dilettante): awesome!

Ink Paper Water

Pen & Brush Doodles

A quick drawing with Diamine Ancient Copper and Diamine Midnight to illustrate how fountain pen ink behaves when diluted with water. The colours love to mix and create interesting patterns. A bit of their vibrancy is lost when dried but there's still a fair amount of colour left.

Quick sketch with fountain pen ink and water

Some colours dissolve easier than others, the Midnight, which is a very dark blue, washes away to almost nothing even though I used a flex pen and some pressure, whereas the outline of the left thigh in Ancient Copper is still clearly visible under the generous wash of water that went over it.
Also the colours don't become permanent like watercolour so they're harder to layer. Still, to sketch, then use a bit of water and bam! Clouds of colour exploding, that's really neat.

There are watercolour pencils and even ink pencils which are designed for a similar purpose but can't quite deliver the same effect. They have other advantages however, like easier layering.

Here's fountain pen ink next to a Faber-Castell ArtGrip watercolour pencil and a Derwent Inktense ink pencil. I tried to put roughly the same amount of pigment on the paper with the two pencils, even taking the lighter colour into account the watercolour pencil is very pale when washed over with water, the Inktense pencil releases its pigments somewhat more readily but in this respect they're both absolutely no match for the fountain pen ink. It seems like you could do a light wash over half the page with the amount of colour provided by that tiny doodle.

Writing home for Christmas

And it's that time of the year coming up again.

As may be obvious, I love beautiful things and sometimes I will grab them despite I can't put them to any immediate use. Blank cards are an example - Crown Mill does them, Zerkall, Amalfi and many more. They are lovely thick paper with matching envelopes, often lined with tissue paper, making a delicious rustling sound to the touch. So two to three dozen cards have accumulated here and, unlike writing paper, they hardly ever get any use.

Writing a letter is one thing, but a card will run out of space at the moment you've discovered you do indeed have something to say. On the other hand I feel that for the shortest of short notes, like "Happy Birthday" or "Merry Christmas", an unprinted card is oddly out of place.

Diamine Ancient Copper plus some water. Shades like heaven.

Still the idea to decorate my own cards didn't occur to me until a few weeks ago when I was looking at a few hideously expensive minimalist christmas cards online.
For as long as I can remember the urge to draw and paint something has raised its tousled head within me every once in a while, usually getting whacked on said head by me and, over time, disappearing again - but this time I gave it a go. I used fountain pens with different inks and nib sizes and a crappy discarded make-up brush (I've discarded that one for good now so it's not depicted ;)).

As any fountain pen user probably knows, non-waterproof ink and water gives a huge bang which cannot be heard but seen. The ink will spread on the paper in an uncontrollable but very charming way. Up to now, every ink I tried has looked fantastic though they do lose some vibrancy when dried.

Hand decorated Christmas card on Roessler Büttenpapier (moulded paper) cardstock: Diamine Ancient Copper, Montblanc Ink of Joy, Diamine Ochre

The really cool thing is that you don't have to be "artsy" to pull this off, for which I am living proof. Everyone is familiar with the shape of an angel or a christmas tree. You don't even need to master symmetry because you can decide to only sketch one side of the motif and that will work just as well.

The card above was the first one I made, in retrospect I think I overdid it a little with the brush but well, I still like it and for sure it's better paper than most ready made cards you can buy. For colouring I used almost 100% Diamine Ancient Copper plus a little Montblanc Ink of Joy for the halo and Diamine Ochre for the writing.

Hand decorated Christmas card on Zerkall Büttenpapier (moulded paper) cardstock: Diamine Sherwood Green, J. Herbin 1670 Rouge Hématite.

 Hand decorated Christmas card on Zerkall Büttenpapier (moulded paper) cardstock: Diamine Sherwood Green, J. Herbin 1670 Rouge Hématite.  

Besides helping me to get along with my Christmas mail, the making of these cards also gave the part of me that wants to draw and paint the opportunity to build up a toehold and take a good look around, so there's some chance you'll be seeing more of that in time, with fountain pens and without.

Hand made leather journals - the "art" journal

approximately 200 sheets of various papers and a pouch full of vintage pens. Good to go!

This is the Mr.-Hyde-Journal that never leaves the house unless it's for private purposes. I dedicated it to writing stories and poems and generally taking notes I could use for writing some day. I find the warm, dark brown more inviting for creative work than the businesslike black.

I picked a large wooden pearl for that one's closure ribbon and shimmering tiger's eye for the spine. It's currently holding 3 notebooks, a Leuchtturm1917 with dot grid, a Semikolon Schreibheft and a DIY one with Amalfi paper, that's the one in the middle with the fuzzy edges. It's very nice and special 100% cotton paper with a lovely soft texture, almost feels like cloth. I believe if you crumpled it in your hand it would behave more like a paper towel than something to write on. Unfortunately some pens share this point of view and won't write more than a few lines on it. Others couldn't care less.

I believe I'd love to get a letter written on this paper, it would feel like some precious gift.
OK, enough of Amalfi paper for now, I'll do a more detailed review of it another time since it's definitely one of my most appreciated papers and interesting too. Did you know that Amalfi has one of the oldest papermills in Europe? They learned the craft from the Arabians.

These hold the refills in place (and look quite beautiful besides).

Since this book has a more private character I also decorated the insides of the cover differently. Well, it's more like a "oh, this is nice, let's stick it to the journal" kind of process than actual decorating. Here's a glimpse.

".. like pictures in their head, and if it's a happy picture they smile and if it's a sad picture they cry." (Mark Haddon)

The quote is from Mark Haddon's "The curious incident with the dog in the night-time" where he tells a story about a boy with Asperger's Syndrome - or more like, lets the boy tell the story himself. It's got several great sentences like this one about how he sees the world, his family and people in general. It's also moving and funny.

Hand made leather Journals - The work journal

By world's best boyfriend

A while ago, I told my boyfriend about journals I had seen around the internet and I said to him I'd like to have something like that in A5 size: refillable, rugged and pretty.The concept is simple: Use a piece of leather to make for a cover. Have rubber strings run down the spine to slip over notebooks and hold them in place.  Have another rubber band attacked to the cover to keep the book closed. That's nearly all. (I'm afraid I'm not explaining this well. Maybe the pictures will help.)

Boyfriend is great with leather and dug just the right hide up: Heavily oiled buffalo, neither stiff nor soft, rugged, beautiful silky6 surface. Something for a nice supple belt, for instance. Really good stuff.

shape and size of your average filofax, though by me much preferred over one.

He made me two books, one black, one chocolate brown. Rounded the corners. Made little ridges in the spine for the rubber strings to fit in. I bought two pearls to make it prettier - I am girl after all -, one mother of pearl, one agate. This black one has become my work journal, I've been carrying it around for the best part of a year now. It ages beautifully.

sturdy rubber strings holding the 3 inserts.

Boyfriend is talented as a craftsman. Needs to have everything perfect once it's finished. I'm different, more the spontaneous, impulsive sort of person, thus filling his perfect journal with battered-looking hand-made notebooks. (Take A4 paper of your choice, 20-30 sheets. Fold in half. Take another sheet of paper as a cover (optional). Take a piece of string. Punch holes through spine, lace string through them, make knot. Done - the sloppy kind of "done", that is.) Still miraculously looks good together.

This motto, attached to the inside of the front cover, is from a postcard which an early tutor of mine had pinned to his office wall. When I got an office wall of my own, I made myself a card to go there. The one that wasn't nice enough for the wall went into the notebook. Silver lining in a nutshell.

closure ribbon with mother of pearl disk + agate pearl gathering the insert strings. 

What about the chocolate brown one? Coming soon.