Waterman Phileas Fountain Pen

I guess the ghosting is appropriate for October…thanks, Waterman, for remembering the holidays.

I’ve been told before that I need to own a Waterman, but the pen stores I frequent typically didn’t carry them and no particularly attractive model was able to catch my eye, thus instigating an e-commerce fueled need-to-buy. Even when an entry model Waterman finally popped up in my local pen store, I was reluctant to get it. “What’s the deal with the Watermans?” I asked skeptically, taking one out of the box. “This is an old man pen. What would I want with one of these?”

“I’ll make you a deal.”

“Phileas? That’s an old man name.”

“I’ll make you a really great deal.”

One really great deal later, here I am with another pen that looks like I swiped it from a geriatric stockbroker.

I am clinically incapable of refraining from calling this pen “Phineas” instead of “Phileas”

The Phileas is a peculiar mix of class and annoying minor flaws. Lets start with the good: the body has a nice weight to it but isn’t too heavy, and feels pretty nicely balanced.

I keep thinking the Phileas is black until Pelikan M150 steps in the picture and says “Gentlemen please, you don’t know what black really is.”

The charcoal-colored plastic feels smooth, almost luxurious (though the words “It doesn’t feel cheap!” come to mind, I don’t think that quite conveys nearly the compliment I intend). Yes, by the way, charcoal-colored—for some reason it continues to surprise me that the pen isn’t black.

Look carefully below the big highlight on the barrel and you’ll see the light hitting the seam in the plastic

My biggest issues: the seams palpable on opposite sides of the black plastic grip—

Why the gap? I’ve heard this decoration is supposed to evoke a cigar band, but I don’t smoke cigars or pens; do cigar bands have such a gap?

—and the way the back of the gold art deco design accent doesn’t fully come together.

Good things in moderation—including art deco

Why is that? Love the design accents; irked by these big flaws.

Time to write down some old fashioned ledger entries.

The third and final flaw: all these ghost starts that proliferate particularly when I print. Taking to the problem an eye loupe and the knowledge I gleaned from sitting in on a Richard Binder nib workshop, I’ve come to suspect the culprit is butt cheeks. What do I mean by such offensive language, you ask? It’s a problem, apparently not uncommon in some fancy pens, where in the quest to make a REALLY SMOOTH pen, they go too smooth, rounding the inside edge of the slit too much, so that the end of the nib resembles a little metallic bottom. This causes the ink to want to stay where it’s narrower, instead of going to the bottom of the cheeks onto the page. Here, a diagram from Richard:

Capillary action is not your friend when you’ve got a baby’s bottom nib

Look! Look closely! The cheeks! THE CHEEEEEEKS.

Once it’s writing, everything is golden for the most part (as long as I stick to cursive). The nib is neither too wet nor too dry, and has a solidly tactile feel across the page. I detect an occasional slight resistance on such backstrokes as crossing my T’s at certain angles, which probably has something to do with the fact that the nib looks like it was aligned inside of a Salvador Dali painting.

What is going ON here? I can’t even visually process this business.

But for the most part, the loveliness of the typical writing experience is worth persevering through the ghosting and such, until I finally get around to fixing up the nib.

With a little workout we’ll firm up those cheeks and have you writing like a normal pen in no time

Waterman Phileas: definitely enjoy…whether or not that enjoyment is enough to inspire future (and or perhaps more expensive) Waterman purchases remains to be seen.

Waterman Phillyboy tallyho what what

If anyone knows a good online retailer, send me a link. Otherwise I think your best bet is to come pick one up from Office Supplies & More, my local pen store (maybe I’ll convince them to take some along to the Ohio Pen Show).

Monteverde Artista Crystal Fountain Pen – Medium Nib – Transparent Turquoise Body

Say goodbye to what is physically the last page in my Behance Dot Grid journal (still have a few more reviews in there I haven’t posted yet though)

At a certain point it becomes difficult to justify buying more demonstrator-style fountain pens with iridium-point nibs—you have so many, no matter how cool this new one seems, and eventually you’d like to afford such luxuries as name brand ramen, and cereal that comes in boxes instead of bags. That’s what the wishlist is for—make sure you save it in a prominent location in the browsers of all your family and friends. I did, and now I can thank my parents for the very-happy-birthday addition of the Monteverde Artista Crystal fountain pen to my arsenal.

Not actual crystal, but you could use it to serve champagne in a pinch.

The smooth resin body has just enough weight to it to feel well-made, but not enough to weigh you down. But it will be collecting fingerprints and smudge marks worse than I collect pens. You’ve been warned.

Excellent accessory for your next Tron Legacy/steampunk costume party.

The aesthetic is unquestionably classy, and the translucent spirals of the included converter (also takes cartridges) is one of the beautiful little things that sets the Artista over the top.

The sublime loveliness of simple things.

Why a clear feed? Because WHY NOT—it’s a wonderful echo of the converter (just as the silver on the converter nicely mirrors the grip and nib). It’s different without being ostentatious.

I have at least half a dozen pens with this almost exact same style of iridium point nib—but this is the first I’ve seen with the designation.

I don’t know much about these nibs, except that I can’t really think of a time they’ve disappointed me, and this is no exception. A medium that writes well on a variety of papers, from Clairefontaine to the cheap printer paper I’m writing this on from work—and it’s neither too wet nor too dry. The only time I’ve had any ink flow problem is when combining cheap paper and extreme angles, but the problem there isn’t flow, it’s that the tip of the nib where both tines meet isn’t in physical contact with the paper.

 

Let’s write a sci-fi novel. With this pen. Starring this pen.

I’m very satisfied with this pen—it’s a great intermediate pen. Once you’ve acquired a few beginner level fountain pens, and you’re ready to fall face-first down the rabbit hole, throwing money all the way, this is a pen worth adding to your insanity collection.

Monteverde Artista Crystal Fountain Pen – Medium Nib – Transparent Turquoise Body at JetPens

 

 

 

 

 

Pilot Plumix Fountain Pen – Medium Flat Italic Nib – Black Body with Blue Ink

The sketches were a bit uninspired. They were...despired. Perspired. Not even spired.

I can’t leave a big-box SuperStore without checking their pen section, and a recent prowl of Target’s pen aisle did not leave me disappointed. For the first time, physically before me in a store where arguably normal people shop, an affordable fountain pen!

Baby, for $6.37 you can take me home any day of the week (provided you have that aforementioned $6.37 plus local tax rate)

The somewhat garishly designed packaging enthusiastically proclaims in sunshine-daycare yellow, “Real Fountain Pen!” …Unlike all those fake fountain pens you’ve had to contend with, Pilot delivers a finely-crafted stick of plastic veracity and unparalleled integrity. Thank goodness Pilot’s on top of these things. And that they’re telling you about it–I would have surely mistaken this for another one of those confoundingly meddlesome fake fountain pens if it weren’t for this astute packaging.

The pen cap is a squid-head. There, now you can't unsee it.

The body of the Plumix is lightweight plastic, but seems well thought-out.

This is not to say that the design of the Squid leaves it completely clean of ink

The cap unscrews from the body (snap-on caps, especially if snapped on with the pen pointing down, encourage the ink to come out, leaving beads of ink on the nib and in the cap. Very wasteful) but posts on the end just by pushing the cap on.

The barrel unscrews from the grip and nib section, and the nib itself is easy to remove so that you can align the grip and nib to be conducive to your hand’s writing posture, a fact I did not figure out until after I’d dropped the pen from my pocket, knocking the nib loose, necessitating my fiddling with the nib.

Deliciously smooth writing on some fantastic Clairefontaine paper, done mostly when the nib was knocked loose. Still wrote!

Having never really removed a nib from a pen before, I found it a surprisingly simple task (“AUGH! UAAGH! THE METAL PART FELL OFF! OH CRAP LET’S JUST WASH EVERYTHING OFF AND HOPE IT’LL ALL GO BACK TOGETHER”), and my original problem with the angle of the nib relative to the positioning of the grip became a moot point–I could angle the nib however I wanted!

Since there isn’t much weight to the body, it’s hard to comment on the balance of the pen, but nothing feels off about the way the pen sits in the hand. Above the grip, the barrel has a slight bulge outward that fits perfectly into the web over the thenar space (thanks, The Internet; I was just going to call it “that fleshy web crook space, you know, the one between your thumb and forefinger, whatsitcalled, you know”) and then tapers off into a slender end. The barrel has these strange parabola-shaped grooves, the purpose of which I cannot discern beyond being merely decorative, and the cap has two modest little anti-roll protrusions that effectively render the cap a convenient squid-shape.

These are all small, simple touches that make a pen unique, and I appreciate them. This is what I feel so many common American pens are lacking–an appreciation of pennovation.

My first comment when I unscrewed the cap: "Where are the little balls on the end??" I did not realize the nib was italic; neither did the packaging.

Before we move on to the nib, the grip needs a little more appreciation. Note how the the bottom of the grip arches up to rest comfortably atop your finger. Carefully discern the subtly cut out concave panel–there are two of these, one for the thumb to grip, the other for the gripping finger of your choice (I rest the pen atop my ring finger, and grip with thumb and middle). The grip is entirely smooth and entirely hard plastic, but it’s comfortable. It’s a carefully designed molding of plastic where I was expecting something bare-minimum. My apologies, Pilot. The grip you designed here is an unexpected delight.

I know we've had some problems with cheap Pilot Medium fountain pen nibs before, but this, this one is different. This one has the power of SUPER QUALITY JAPAN.

The nib, I’m happy to report, is not like other cheap Pilot fountain pen nibs. Granted, I don’t really have any other Pilot italic nibs for comparison (or any italic nibs for comparison), but this one seems to put out a decent but not excessive amount of ink, and it writes so smoothly (especially on Rhodia and Clairefontaine paper) that I can’t stop writing in cursive with this pen. The mere act of cursive writing is so fun! I just keep writing nonsense even when I have nothing of substance to write. And my handwriting asymptotically approaches being pretty!

At the end of the day, this is a fun and cheap (AND REAL!!!) fountain pen that you can (provided your Target has them in stock) get with instant gratification, ripping open the package the moment your transaction is complete, and it makes writing fun. Isn’t that what a pen should really be for?

 

A pen should also be for use as a weapon in an emergency situation or a dramatic scene in a television drama.

You can’t order them online from Target, but they do have a link to find it at a Target store: Pilot Plumix Refillable Fountain Pen – Blue at Target

 

And, because I love JetPens, they get a link too:Pilot Plumix Fountain Pen – Medium Flat Italic Nib – Black Body at JetPens

Kaweco Sport Classic Fountain Pen – Medium Nib – White Body with Aubergine Purple Ink

Aubergine, or, as normal people call it, eggplant purple. Click to gaze upon the majesty.

I’d like to introduce you to the very first compact fountain pen I bought, the Kaweco Sport Classic. I originally bought this pen because I had this notion that it would be my winter pen (since it was white, like all the snow I wanted but would probably not get) and match my purple winter coat with its aubergine ink (this part was actually accomplished).

Some people have accused this pen of being a tampon. Some people should just get bent, because I like this pen anyway.

The compact size makes this pen great for carrying around in my coat pocket, and the screw-on cap means I don’t have to worry about it coming open and redecorating the interior of my coat.

The quality of this picture leaves a lot to be desired. Like, for instance, quality.

With the cap posted, the pen is of a comfortable length for writing, and just generally holding, looking as though you’re about to write.

Sometimes I’ve found I’ll post the cap too…forcefully?…and I’ll have to put some effort in to get it back off; maybe this is me, maybe this is the pen. The body is lightweight, but doesn’t just feel like cheap plastic–this plastic is sturdier, more willing to suffer the slings and lint of life in a pocket.

Just the right hint of fanciness without costing a fancy gentleman's fortune.

As for writing, I have no problem with the nib–the nib is satisfactory, and I was pleasantly surprised at the line variation I was able to achieve with this pen. However, and this may be an ink issue, the performance of this pen varies greatly with the paper used. On Leuchtturm 1917 dot grid paper, it takes an impractical span of forever for the ink to dry, but it doesn’t bleed through. On Moleskine paper it performs abysmally, as does everything besides a ballpoint pen. Writing the review, it did great and dried quickly, but is about to bleed through the page.

The seedy underbelly (seeds not included)

I haven’t had any problems so far with the nib drying up or refusing to write, nor does it tear up my paper (a disadvantage of some fine-nib fountain pens I’ve had…but then, this isn’t a fine nib pen). Unfortunately, there’s nothing much impressive to say about a medium nib. WOW, SO EXACTLY NEITHER BROAD NOR FINE! It’s just not as exciting, you see. But the nib has performed well for me so far, and the experience of writing with the pen has been one of warm contentment.

They see me rollin--NO WAIT, THEY DON'T. Kaweco fountain pen, you are designed specifically NOT to roll!

I like the octagonal cap design, especially for a compact pocket pen. You get the advantage of not having the pen roll away, like you would have with a clip, without having to worry about a clip getting caught on something in your pocket and wreaking utter destruction until the clip breaks off. There is an optional metal clip for the Kaweco Sport fountain pens, if you want. I haven’t had a chance to try it out yet, so I’ll reserve judgment.

Comparing to other compact fountain pens, the Kaweco seems more durable, has a better (or at least, better looking) nib, and writes much more cleanly. I can use this pen to write or sketch. It does tend toward bleeding through the paper, but with a color this lovely I’m willing to forgive it. At the time of writing this, the aubergine ink is out of stock, but hopefully JetPens will get this back in stock soon (though I’m only about to run out on my first cartridge out of six, so I have time to wait).

If you’re looking for a compact fountain pen that isn’t fueled with molten adorability, but instead want a nice, minimalist, classy little fountain pen, the Kaweco Sport Classic is a good starter option.

 

 

 

Plus, the gold accents just look snazzy

Kaweco Sport Classic Fountain Pen at JetPens

Kaweco Fountain Pen In Cartridge – Aubergine Purple at JetPens