While I am fairly new to the world of fountain pens and inks, I have been writing on notepads for a couple of decades. Many of my writing projects start as longhand pages, until I have enough of the project "solidified" that I'm able to move to the word processor to chisel out the digital file that will serve as the final product.
However, my new fountain pen interest has led to a new consideration of the paper I use for handwriting. Having read several of the reviews in this particular forum, I decided to head to my local stationer's shop to pick up some small notepads from a number of companies to do a comparison, a longhand taste test, if you will.
I came home and laid out my new paper treasures, as well as the following writing instruments:
- Lamy Safari (Fine) with Lamy black cartridge
- Lamy Vista (Fine) with Lamy blue-black cartridge
- Lamy Accent Black (Fine) with Lamy black bottle ink
- Lamy AL-Star (Medium) with Lamy blue cartridge
Here are my thoughts on the different papers.
Clairefontaine
Very smooth paper with eye-pleasing brightness and whiteness. I was amazed how the paper actually made the fine nibs write like extra-fines, and made the medium nib write like a fine nib. The black inks looked good, but the blue and blue-black inks didn't jump off the page. Nice paper, but not awe-inspiring. I can see why so many people on the forums recommend Clairefontaine, but it wasn't a front-running standout for me. Although, if I wanted to write with a medium nib full-time, I could see wanting to use these notepads for their "thinning" effect.
Apica
Wow. Just, wow. Although this was the most plain looking notebook out of the bunch (CD-11), I was amazed by this paper. It had more tooth to it than the Clairefontaine, but was still very smooth and pleasant to write on. The black inks looked very good; the blue-black and blue inks looked sensational. The medium nib left a bold line that I didn't think I would like, but it was a pleasure to read later. All of the inks seemed to absorb and dry faster on the Apica paper than on any of the others I tried.
Moleskin
I love the design of the Moleskin Reporter's Notebooks. I find them very comfortable to write in while in a number of different sitting positions on a sofa or in a chair. I like the look of the paper, and the narrower lines compliment my relatively small handwriting. That said, the performance with FP inks was very inconsistent. I was noticing differences even from page to page in the way the paper would take the different inks. The blue-black ink was hopelessly faint. The black inks were patchy. The blue ink from the medium nib was the best, most consistent line. While I love the functionality of the notepad itself, the paper is probably better suited to ballpoints or rollerballs.
Ecojot
I really wanted to love this notebook. Made from 100% post-consumer recycled paper, it even has recycled metals in the coil binding! And, it's designed, printed, and made in my native land of Canada. The paper brightness and whiteness was excellent, and all of the inks really jumped off of the page. The problem is with the page lines; the ink Ecojot uses for printing lines on the page showed right through all of the Lamy inks! I had to look twice to believe it, but the pen ink doesn't even make a dent on the page line. This doesn't impact the writing process, but it's pretty distracting when trying to read your work later on.
Whitelines
It may seem somewhat blasphemous to have dark paper with white lines running through it, but I was very pleasantly surprised by how attractive script was in the Whitelines notepad. All of the inks showed well on the page, although the basic black was the most readable. While I don't think I would use Whitelines as my full-time paper, it is an eye-pleasing alternative that makes for a fun, creative change of pace.
Rhodia
This was probably the most surprising of the papers I tried, given how many positive things I'd read about it. The paper was very smooth and easy to write on, but I found the final result to look overly-thin and drab. The paper had the same line-thinning quality as the Clairefontaine, but my handwriting looked anemic rather than sharp. I went back to the Rhodia a couple of hours later, because I thought that I may not have given it a fair shake. My opinion, however, didn't improve.
Final Thoughts
This wasn't a super-thorough comparison test, of course. I only used pens and ink from one manufacturer; your mileage could (and likely would) vary with your various writing instruments and inks. In the end, I was incredibly impressed with the performance of the Apica notebook, and I see myself getting many more of them in the future. The Whitelines notebooks will definitely make an appearance in my writing routine when I want to mix it up. And, I still plan to use the occasional Moleskin and Ecojot notebook, although probably only when I'm traveling with just a rollerball, ballpoint, or pencil.
I hope that this informal review was informative for you. Please feel free to leave your comments and feedback.
Cheers,
A.J.