Pelikan Place de la Concorde

[Sonnet]

As you may have read recently, I purchased a Pelikan M620 Place de la Concorde. Now that the pen's skipping problems have been solved, I can do a complete review. To recap: the pen first arrived with a standard medium nib that wouldn't write. It skipped, it was a hard-starter, etc. The seller, Pam Braun, graciously did a nib exchange and the new medium nib writes like a charm. I love this pen!! I never would have imagined spending over $100 on a fountain pen until I did it twice in the last 2 years. This pen usually retails for $250-350 but I was able to get it at a much better price; that's my new cut-off point for fountain pen prices. As you can see in the below pictures from World Lux, the Place de la Concorde is made up of alternating bands of gray, light blue and tan color rings. Pelikan refers to the material as "noble resin," which I suppose is a fancy phrase for "smooth plastic." What doesn't always show up in pictures is: the accuracy of the color scheme, and the pearlescent effect of the barrel. As you rotate the pen, you can see "wisps" of a pearlescent effect on some of the color bands. Note: the piston knob and part of the section are a plain light blue. The trim and clip are silver [rhodium-plating, I believe] with the tradtional Pelikan two-tone 18-carat gold nib.

 

Filling system: Pelikan piston. Smooth, takes in a lot of ink. Unlike most Pelikan piston-filling pens, the Place de la Concorde does NOT have an ink window; it's also completely opaque. However, I've yet to run out of ink in the middle of a sentence.

 

Nib: Again, the new nib is excellent! I have 2 other Pelikans, one with a broad steel nib and the other a stubbed steel nib from Richard Binder [0.6 mm]. I'd gotten used to the broad nib even though my handwriting is really too small for it. The Place de la Concorde's medium nib is just as smooth and better suited to my handwriting. It's behaved well with both cheap paper [like Moleskine and inkjet paper] and good paper like Clairefontaine. I've been writing with this pen every chance I get.

 

Other dimensions: The special edition M620 pens are based on the Pelikan M600 sizes. It's a bit longer than my M200 but this means I can write without having to post the cap. It still feels well-balanced and light in my hands if I do post the cap.

 

So far, I've used Waterman South Seas Blue, Private Reserve American Blue, Private Reserve DC Supershow 2005 blue, PR Tanzanite, and Aurora Black in the Place de la Concorde. It's performed well with all the inks but I may keep it filled with either of the PR blue inks most of the time. The dark blue ink just seems to go with the pen's light blue color bands.

 

I wouldn't describe the Place de la Concorde's nib as flexible, but it is wonderfully smooth and responsive-- I'm so glad the nib exchange with Pam worked out! Although I've only seen the Concorde sold in fine, medium and broad nib sizes, I believe you can do a nib exchange with ChartPak [Pelikan's US repair service] for the other nib sizes, from extra fine to oblique triple-broad. You could also purchase an M600/605 nib in another size from places like Swisher Pens. Again, my nib exchange was just to correct a faulty nib that skipped all the time, even after washing the pen out and trying various paper/ink combinations.

 

The Concorde comes in a light blue, sturdy presentation box with a brochure/warranty booklet from Pelikan. The booklet explains the history behind the actual Place de la Concorde in Paris-- although it was King Louis XIV who lost his head there, not King Ludwig!

 

Below is a link to pictures of the Place de la Concorde pen from World Lux's website. Keep in mind though, that the pen is hard to photograph and on some websites, it might look more blue [or even lavender] than what you see here.

 

 

Place de la Concorde pen photos

[JRodriguez]

Nice review. I absolutely love the "pearlescent" effect the material under the resin has in the light, and I've yet to see a picture that captures it. Glad the pen is working out for you! I love mine!

[lanatir]

lovely review! i love this pen and enjoyed it very much when i had the chance to photograph it...

 

See here!

[Sonnet]

Terrific photographs! I officially love this pen :bunny1: