http://www.bibles-direct.com/category.phtml?Category=64

I am waiting for this to come in so I will keep you all posted

Chris

Fascinating. Do you know how "India Paper" is with fountain pens? Are there any other sources for this type of paper.

Sounds very interesting. I'll wait for more info.

You can find photos and a review here:
http://www.bibledesignblog.com/2008/02/the...-jour.html#more

gary

Hi Chris

That looks a very interesting journal. I look forward to reading how it behaves with fountain pens

David

I too am interested to see how this paper takes to FP ink (especially Noodler's). Did you get the one with the "Allan's" logo on it, or are you getting the newer one that just says "Journal"?

It's beautiful. I'd buy it right away if it hadn't "Allan's Journal" stamped on the cover... Neither "Journal".

That's extraordinarily good value - shame about the 'Allan's Journal' though - an object lesson in how to ruin your product. Maybe someone should have a quiet word with Allan. I suppose you could scratch it off or stick something over it ..

If you haven't come across India paper , it's incredibly thin - so much so that a complete Lord of the Rings is less than an inch thick. I've got a copy of Vanity Fair (usually airport thickness) that is even thinner. By its very nature it is slightly transparent, but I don't think it would suffer from bleed through. Smythson do similar notebooks, but not at £15

John

<bump>

I'd also like to read a review once the journal arrives.

Curious that the size changed in the redesign - going from 2 models roughly comparable to the Moleskine journal and pocket sizes, to one model somewhere in between. I haven't used a 6 1/8 x 4 1/2 notebook before, but I do use index cards that size all the time, so I might be tempted to give one of these a whirl.

Ryan.

I am another member waiting with baited breath for a review of how the journal works with a fountain pen. I have been looking for a journal like this for years, but want to make sure it will work with a fp before I plunk down the green.

Donnie

I was thinking of writing out portions of Scripture by hand and giving it to my son some day. This would work well for that

Chris,

Did it arrive? How do you like it? Is it FP friendly? Pictures of your writing in it?

Thanks,

John

Any update?

I'm anxious!!!!

I have just ordered two of these and will let you know how they perform when they arrive. Certainly, they look from the website to be lovely and if they are as nice as I hope, it will be worth searching for the right pen and ink combination to use in them.

Chris

The journal looks great, and I hope that it responds well to a fountain pen. Looking forward to reading what you think Chris

David

Still waiting for the postman to arrive! And I'm out all day tomorrow, which means no chance until Monday.
Chris

OK - the postman was late, and my new journals have arrived.
They are beautiful!

Soft, flexible black leather cover with rich grain impression, gilt page edges, marker ribbon included; in my view, very well made. Simply says JOURNAL on the cover in gold. Nice, rounded corners.

Page size is 6" x 4 3/8" and with a slightly oversize cover, the journal size is 6 1/4" x 4 3/4" - somewhere midway between A5 and A6.

The pages are of very thin paper and are lined - pale blue lines 4mm apart (ie very narrow). No margin line and the orientation of the lines can be a mm off perfect regarding the top/bottom of the page. This is more noticeable because of the narrow lines.

Some people might find they write on alternate lines if their script is a little large; others might find using every line these journals will last a very long time! I don't know how many pages there are - lots and lots it seems.

Now for the vital part - writing with a real pen and ink was lovely - smooth and effortless, but not slippery.
I have only tried a test page at the back of the pristine journal of what I had to hand but that was:

Sheaffer Statesman - medium nib - Waterman Red
Sheaffer Statesman - medium nib - Pelikan Black
Sheaffer Statesman - medium nib - Pelikan Purple
Sheaffer Valiant - broad nib - blue-black mixed from Pelikan blue-black, Pelikan black, Cross blue and Penman Sapphire
Cross Century - broad nib - Penman Sapphire

Results:
No feathering that I could detect, even with the very wet Valiant and Cross broad nibs.
Some bleed-through, as might be expected for such thin paper, with all inks, but minimal with the Pelikan black. All were visible through the page.

I have no doubt that if you use fine nibs and inks that are not prone to bleed, you will have no problems. However, given the thinness of the paper, you might find you can only write on one side of the paper. This requires further experimentation.

I believe you cannot have it both ways - fine paper means some translucency: opacity requires thicker paper.

Price £15 each inclusing postage in UK - not cheap, but not over-priced compared with many "trendy" journals I saw yesterday in a high-end London store.

Now I have a reason not to spend £10 on a Moleskine

I am so pleased I am going to request more when I call to pay for these. The folks at Allan kindly sent me two journals and asked that I paid when I received them if I liked them!

Chris

edit - misspelled Allan!

Chris,

Thanks for the update. If possible, we'd love to see a writing sample on the paper.

John

Thanks for sharing your first observations with us, Chris.
Now we're waiting for... some PHOTOS

+ 1 for photos, particularly of the back of the page.

When you say bleed through, is ink actually penetrating through the page and on to the next, or do you simply see a heavy shadow on the back side?

4mm spacing! Wow! I'm going to have to print off a sheet with that spacing and see how it feels.

Thanks, Chris, for taking the plunge and sharing your experience with the rest of us.

Ryan.

ps - how flat does the journal lay? Given its small size and large number of pages, I'm hoping it does as well as a Moleskine on that count.

edit: additional obsessive question added in postscript

Thanks for the update.

I tried ordering one, and found that only Canadian need to pay tax for this journal. I thought the store is located in UK. Is there shipping cost?

Quick update:

OK photos - I find that my work phone has a camera and when I figure out how to use it I'll post some pictures. Hey, to me a snorkel is new technology let alone digital cameras on a phone My camera uses proper film...

Bleed-through - ink is soaking into the paper so that it is visible from the other side not just as a shadow but clearly as ink in the fibres. However, ink is not penetrating right through the page and so would not mark the next page when writing (at least, not with the inks so far).

New ink trials.
- Diamine Registrar's Ink in a vintage Waterman W5 - visible from the back of the page but not really bleeding into the paper. Oddly, the ink does not turn dark blue-black on this paper but, froma quick wipe with a damp finger, seems nevertheless to be water-resistant. This combination might well be OK for writing on both sides of the paper and still being perfectly legible.
(I'm using this pen for the Registrar's Ink in the belief there is nothing apart from plastic/rubber and gold in contact with the ink).
- Visconti blue in a MB 145 Chopin medium - the most bleed into the paper, but this is a very wet writer - luxurious flow I would say - and the merest hint of feathering visible with a loupe. You could not easily write on both sides of the paper with this combination.
- Esterbrooke 9556 nib and Diamine black - no feathering and minimal bleed. So far, perhaps the best combination if thinking of using both sides - which is pretty good for black ink.

I should have said these journals do not have a little elastic band (but you could attach one yourself if you are that way inclined and appropriately practical).

It does not lay completely flat in the way a ring binder would, but I believe it is flat enough for all practical purposes. Sorry if that sounds vague but I don't have a Moleskine to compare and my impression of them in the shop was that the Moleskine is not totally "lay flat" either.

I do hope someone else gets one of these so we can compare notes. I have ordered a couple more for presents!! Phew, that's a lot of cash

Chris

edit: ps the £15 includes UK postage but I don't know about overseas costs.

From the Allan's website:
"We have been sending bibles to customers all over the world for almost 140 years... ...Delivery times will vary according to distance. We aim to deliver within 21 days from the day you order. The prices shown include delivery charges."

That certainly sweetens the pot in terms of value, IMO. Though the .75 GBP tax for Canadians has me a bit mystified, I must admit.

Ryan.

I ordered one. Waiting for it to arrive. It will become my church notebook.

Just ordered one.

I've been looking for an onionskin style notebook for a long time. I never knew to look for 'India paper'. I'd actually gone so far as to contact dictionary publishers looking for one, but I never thought to ask at a bible publisher, though now, of course, it seems obvious.

Needless to say, I'm very excited.

My one regret is that I recently lost my Pilot VP F, which I suspect would have been the best of my bunch on this paper. Time to think about a replacement, I suppose.

Ryan.

edit: rogue prepositions

Another quick update - the Diamine Registrar's ink does darken but takes a day or two for it to happen.
I sacrificed a page to do a water test and this ink was totally unafected by a five minute soak in cool water, though Pelikan black ran/washed out a bit but remained readable and Waterman red washed out to a pale pink and remianed just legible.

So, for me, it will be Registrar's ink and the Waterman W5, which is a flexible fine nib, as the combination of choice.

And I'm still wrestling with the camera

Chris

I got mine in the mail yesterday. There was some problem with the purchase so they sent it and asked me to sent payment back. Amazing! It is a very nice book and fits neatly into my Bible carrier. I hope the dollar recovers so I can buy some more.

I'm wondering if any of you ever tried to write with a pencil in them?
Does that work? is the paper too smooth to leave enough grafite residu?
I already ordered one, so within a week or two I can find out myself, but I'm so curious.
I always used rather large, thick leaved notebooks sofar, but this might be what I've been looking for for a long time!
256 pages to write on, thin papered, not to large notebook!

What is the thickness of the whole notebook? Does anyone have a weight?
It looks like a perfect candidate for long trips/travels or tiny spaced people like me
And with 15GBP it is nearly cheap! the notebooks i bought sofar where about €25 each for 144 leaves.
It was excelent paper, writeable on two sides, hard cover, nice bound.

It is a pitty I already ordered a Smythson classic floppy pigskinned black notebook.
That was waaaaaayyyy more expensive and could have bought me at least 10 of allan's notebooks!
But it did make a nice birthday present...

My Allan's journal arrived on Friday, and I'm very impressed!

The leather cover looks, smells, and feels great, and the quality of the bookbinding is first rate. As Chris noted, this notebook looks built to last.

@ alecgold: weight - 180g, thickness - 14mm. Not bad for 254 pages!

I've attached a few pics and some comments. As will be obvious from the quality of the photos, photography is not one of my enthusiasms - sorry!

The goatskin is lovely in the hand. Pelikan M805 for reference.


The endpapers are either really thin leather or a nice leatherettte.


A couple more heavy endpapers before the lined Oxford paper starts.


Talk about narrow rule!


As Chris mentioned, there are shadows, and some inks perform better than others. Note the irony of the 'I don't think the shadow will be an issue" comment 3/4 of the way down. The heavy shadow and teeny, tiny (near the margin) bleed through come from a J. Herbin ink (Lie de The) in my very wet Lamy 2000 EF - a proven Moleskine paper destroyer - think completely unusable back side with spots of ink all over the following page. So, in comparision, the Allan's (very thin) paper holds up amazingly well.


The shadows on the ink test page actually came out darker in the photo than they do in real life. I think that most well behaved inks in a fine-nibbed pen will be more than acceptable.





I really like this notebook. Even the gold stamp on the front (usually a deal breaker) doesn't put me off. For 15 GBP shipped, it's a bargain.

If you've ever wanted an onionskin/oxford/bible paper notebook, this is the one.

Ryan.

Thanks, Ryan!! Great review.



Oh noooooooooooo! Lie de The is my favourite ink

I should clarify: any Herbin ink in this pen kills Moleskines - and the unusability comment was meant to refer to Moleskines. The Allan's handled my Moleskine killer combo admirably well, with no feathering on the actual written side, just a shadow on the back. In a drier, finer pen, I wouldn't hesitate to try the LdT with the Allan's again. I'd expect it to act like the Diamine Prussian Blue did: slightly heavier shadow than the Noodler's bulletproof, but good to go. As Chris observed above, with paper this thin, one can't expect 100% opacity.

R.

ps Lie de The is a great colour!

For anyone clicking through to this review, note the new version no longer has a slip case.

R.

Thanks a lot for the review, Ryan!
It is much appreciated, certainly the photo's, but especially the photo's of the ink testing & the backside of that page!
Gives a lot of information about what to expect.
I think I will write a lot in it with my Sterling Perfect Pencil from Graf von Faber-Castell, because I really like to take notes and make sketches with that.

The weight and thickness (or the thinness should be more appropriate perhaps) makes it a superb EDC IMHO and I'm really starting to regret
the purchase of the Smythson's floppy manuscript with pigskin cover.
The size seems good for EDCing, goatskin(?) leather cover, nice strong make which will make it last when it is used often and carried everyday.
If it keeps up it's promise, I'll have to stock up a small pile of those handy notebooks.
And why not? at £15 it is realtive cheap, compared with all the other notebooks I've been able to find.
Certainly there are cheaper ones, but they tend to have horrible quality paper or they aren't binded, but have a staple through (in the better cases) or are glued
in some unbelievable way (the ones that start falling apart after a couple of days of (ab)use).

For now the only drawback I can find is the missing slipcase, as there is no elastic band as well. But that wouldn't be to hard to fabricate...

So now I'm even more eagerly awaiting the delivery of my newest notebook!

Despite to excelent review before me, I would like to post a comparison between an Smythson's Travel Notes and a Allan's Journal.
Perhapse some-one else could do an "in-dept" review between Moleskine's and Allan's or Smythson's?

I don’t know if I should post this review here or in a new thread, but perhaps I will do both.

I already had a travel notes book from Smythson, one in the Panama Series.
Now I also have a Allan’s Journal to compare it to.
First I would like to describe both items.

The Travel Notes is a very nice and luxuriously looking little notebook. Dimensions are 14cm x 9cm. Thickness is around 14mm. This is a nice format for the back pocket of any jeans or pants, but also for most pockets in or on a jacket coat or shirt.
The construction seems to be very good, after a couple of weeks of carrying, I can say it does get a nice patina. The outer is made of calfskin leather, very supple, soft and warm to the touch, it is aniline colored, so it will not fade easily. Because the leather is so soft and supple I’m a bit scared to scuff or damage it, but so far it didn’t happen.
On the front is has a simple text “Travel Notes” in silver.
On the inside there are 128 pages of soft blue paper. The first and last page holds some text as to show how good this booklet and the company are. Not needed a bit of a shame/waist of paper but not very disturbing either.
Also there is a bit thick ribbon marker, black, to easily find the where you left of your last notes, I really like two ribbons in a notebook, one for business and one for leisure note-taking.
When looking carefully you can see the pages are not really lined but more dotted with blue dots that form a line. In use it appears to be a thin line and it doesn’t disturb the writing or ink drying.
What I did notice at first is that the ink takes serious time to dry. I like to stamp every page of my notebook with a automatic revolving number stamp (Reiner B2, very handy, high quality, extreme pricing) and the red ink, even though it was an old pad, took it’s time getting into the paper. When writing with my very wet Visconti Wall Street LE (that one with the o-so-nice power filler) and Visconti blue ink, it took a really good wait at the end of each page before the ink was dry enough to not stain the previous page.
There was no feathering of any kind. So far so good, but the surprise was on the other page.
The pages are very thin (50gr/m2) and have silver gilding, which is very classy IMHO. There is even a watermark in every page.
Although this is serious thin and normally absolutely not the material to write a big fat wet Visconti on, the other page had only a tiny trace of shading, but certainly no bleed, nothing.
My guess is the paper has extra glue in it so it keeps together better, that seems to be supported by the slow drying ink. On the other hand, the paper is slight blue, so there is less of a chance that “half way bleeds” can be detected. When you compare the blue paper with white paper, the white is more translucent or and bleeds easier noticeable.
Writing with ballpoints or pencils is no problem either, although pencils are a bit more difficult to distinguish on those blue pages.
The paper made a very good impression on me, it shouts Smythson’s, I’m classy and expensive.
There are headings on each page for “place”, “date” and “notes”. Could be handy, but in my highly expressive opinion? Mwoah.
Every bottom says Smythson’s of Bond street in a non-offensives way.
Then there is the price. I don’t know what the £ against the $ does, but it costs £55 or € 79
No, there is no typo in that. This is a serious pricy little notebook.
That is £0,42 per leaf or £0,21 per page! You’ll have to do some mighty important writing to justify those costs.
When you order this book alone there is a £10 penalty for shipping cost. Don’t think it can be done cheaper, I ordered a floppy classic manuscript as well and the shipping got up to £30. Wow, that is serious shipping! It took a quick 3 days to arrive but I ordered a total of 320 leaves and got £0,092 shipping cost per leaf. So the total costs are £0,512 per leaf.
Al this calculating might seem like a bit nitpicking, but it is not like a bilbe that I order once and expect to be used for several generations, these are my EDC notebooks that get worn out in a matter of months if not weeks, they are “consumables” and therefore I think the price is very important in the overall comparison.


In the other corner there is a (AFAIK) non-marketed Allan’s Journal (AJ).
I don’t know if there is a bricks & mortar shop, but I bought them, just as the Smythson’s, on the Internet.
The website is a bit sparse with information, but good enough. Checkout is nice secured, delivery times stated as 21 days. Hmm, 21 days? Three weeks to get an envelope from Britain to Holland? Well, 21 days anywhere in the world is what they try to achieve. It took 8 days to arrive in Holland, so that wasn’t too bad, especially when you get the notebook for £15 including the shipping cost!

But lets begin at the beginning. There was a slip cover in the past, but that is no longer. There is no elastic band like the moleskins, but it has a goatskin leather cover. Nice. Not as nice as the Travel Notes (TN), it is much tougher leather, less supple and a bit stiffer. Not so much that it is uncomfortable, but reassuring stiff. When you open it in a U-shape the cover doesn’t fold, instead it curves very nicely! It looks like it can take a beating to be honest about it. And when I see what Every Day Carry can do to a notebook this is a very good thing.
Overall construction seems to be good, nice quality binding, sewn through the paper.
When opening the cover of an AJ there is an inside of thin plastic with a leather look. It could be leather, but it is so thin, I expect it to be a poly-urethane layer. On one hand I find it a pity. It still is plastic, on the other hand, it could make the notebook much tougher and more resilient to tear/wear on the weakest link: the paper that binds between the book-block and the cover. Time will tell.
There are first some pages of a bit thicker paper, and then the India paper starts. 128 leaves of thin Oxford paper.
This is nice paper, just like some bible’s, where they didn’t use the super-thin but a more sturdy paper. It’s white, nice, blue lined (real lines) and one thing that I notice is the lining and the edges are not exactly parallel. There is about a mm difference. The lines are narrow, 4mm, and go from top to bottom of the page. No headers here, no “waste of space”, just as much writing space as possible. The edges have a gold gilding, but no read underneath. It’s a bit extra fancy, not needed IMHO, but nothing wrong with as well.
Writing on the paper shows a bit of shadows on the other page. My Visconti with blue Visconti ink was just not readable on the other page, but showed itself well. Not a serious problem, but just not as good as the TN. Call it “most FP resistant”, but certainly not “every FP proof”!
But when writing with a Pilot Vanishing point (F) it held up good. And with a Pilot Vanishing Point (EF) it was even better perfect as the TN.
When writing with a ballpoint or pencil there is no problem at all.

The verdict.
I distinguished several points, which are important in my daily use.
First is the construction. This is a tie, both are equally well constructed, be it in there own way, the TN a bit more prone to damage with softer leather, the AJ being a bit less classy.
Second is the paper. Here the nod goes to the TN. The paper is slightly better, but it is a close finish
Third is the price. Here a hefty head-banging-yes-nod goes to the AJ.
At £15 including shipping it beats the TN which cost £65 incl. shipping
If you calculate that leaf by leaf it is a £0,117 or £0,507

Overall I think the Allan’s Journal is the winner. If you need bragging rights, be my guest, buy the Travel Notes.
And even though I’m one of the worst Homo Economicus alive today and should buy more TN’s, I first ordered 10 extra AJ’s. Something this nice and economical couldn’t possibly last long in this strange society we live in today.

Ahhh, that makes sense - I suppose it's why classic airmail stationery was blue!


Yikes! No kidding! I'd end up leaving it sit on the shelf until I had something profound enough to say (read: likely never).


I'd definitely agree with that.


As I suspected - I miss my VP!

As an aside, where did you get an EF VP? From a nibmeister?

Thanks for the comparison! Very interesting.

Ryan.

p.s. I'd love to see a full review with photos of the floppy manuscript, too!

R.

You know, I was thinking this myself, though I must admit, ordering 10 more wasn't my immediate reaction to that thought!

R.

Well, I sometimes have a bit of an acute collectors syndrom: this good, this "cheap" GET MORE
But 5 are for friends and friendly business relations, the other 5 are for my own use.
The VP EF is an altered F, I did it myself a few years ago, but nowady's I would say it takes to much time
and the result isn't bad, but certainly not as good as my 1911 Naginata Togi nib.
But an F is also reasonably good.
I think I still have 4 or 5 of the old VP's as I could buy a few from a store that sold them out at
for me agreeable prices. I think I paid 100 Euro's for 4 or 5 at that time. I just use one on a somewhat regular basis.
These are the older, 1980's style model, but I prefer them to the now-a-days fat model.
http://i3.ebayimg.com/07/i/000/cb/fa/6463_1.JPG like this.
I could have a red or green to spare. You could have it at shipping cost as far as I'm concerned.

The review for the floppy is coming, there is just one concern: I just don't dare to write in it! 170 British Pounds Sterling to write in such a thing?
I hardly can get myself to open it and look at it :S

Dear Ryan and Alecgold,

Thank you for the excellent additional reviews and comparisons. Smythsons are superb indeed, but I too would think none of my ramblings are worthy of being committed to such expensive paper!

Now that I have had my Allan a few weeks, I find I am using it most days for a jotting or a note or two, and to save space/reduce speed of use I'm now using both sides of the paper. With a fine-ish nib and a not-too-wet an ink, it is working perfectly. When I get to the end of my Diamine Registrar's ink, I will try out the bulk bottle of "registrar's ink" from HSS.

I now have four of these great journals, and might get a few more now that the perversity of society's recognition of a good product and its consequential demise has been raised. OTOH, Allan's print/bind bibles and that is where the inspiration for this product comes from, I suspect.

With all of the interest from here, perhaps Allan's might venture into expansion and offer more sizes of these journals in the future (I hope - always ready to try more).

Chris

Yep, you all just made me go out and buy one I'm excited!

You'll like it. I know I do. Don't forget to share your opinion!
And use it a lot.
I've been writing in it with a pencil, so I'm not a good judge of the use of fountainpens in it, but
as far as construction, paper quality, leather quality etc. it is very good.
I've been wearing it in the back pocket of my jeans and it holds out surprisingly well.
There are no real marks on the leather yet, but at the corners where it is a little bit thicker
you'll start to notice some "patina".

This afternoon I was in a particular boring meeting I had to attend (needed to say something for at least 2 minutes!, I hate being used as technical wonder & miracle maker) and the Journal was laying on the table in front of me.
The weather is hot, really nice summer day, and I was dreaming a bit away and enjoying the pleasure
of the high quality leather. The grooves, the lines, the start of the patina, the nice combination with
a Faber-Castell Perfect Pencil and a black wood pencil in it. I really enjoyed it.

Am I really getting mental??

ooh well. just let me know what you think and don't forget to mention crictical points, Allan's could perhaps improve a bit on it!

Well, time does tell, so time for an update.
About two months ago I started using the Allan's Journal and I still carry it on a daily basis. I carry it sometimes in my jeans backpocket, sometimes in my laptop messenger and often it lays on my desk when I'm working.
After some tiring letters or reading a difficult piece of law, I write something in my journal, make some notes about the work, make a grocery list or anything else that is worth or needed writing down.
I'm now halfway, using both sides of the leafs, and I expect that it will last another month orso, as I need to write and work a lot in the next months.
But there is no crack or damage to the leather.
The spine is holding up surprisingly well, no signs of use there.
The bookblock and the cover are still very well in tackt, nothing shows any use there.
Only thing I noted is the gilding on the rounded corners that comes off a bit. Well, that is no big deal to me.
It gets a nice patina and I'm certainly happy I ordered some more of these nice journals.