Forest Choice Notebooks - Excellent!

[keegan]

Just a quick public service announcement about Forest Choice notebooks (no affiliation). I ordered a set on a whim and found them to be excellent! The best pocket (3.5x5.5") notebook I've yet tried for fountain pen use (Clairefontaine still rules the paper battle, but I like the less bright white, the tidy top margin and the thinner ruling of these books better. Plus - sustainability!) I put them up against the best Field Notes, and they won handily. (this may not be a surprise to most of you, Field Notes are mostly bad with fountain pen inks.)

The Forest Choice paper is far superior to even the best Field Notes books for fountain pen use (most Field Notes are 50# paper, except AmericatheBeautiful, Shelterwood and Travelling Salesman, which are 70# and better).

In my test, both the FC and the FN have 70# paper. The Forest Choice paper is thinner, smoother, less bleedy, and shows more ink shading than the Field Notes paper. The Forest Choice also has a superior stitched (vs. stapled) binding and more pages (80 vs 48). They showed equal show through on the back of the pages (moderate).

Forest Choice offers a far superior writing experience, more pages for the same thickness of notebook, and your fountain inks will look much better. The only thing Field Notes wins on is "coolness" and "collectibility." (but most editions are the useless 50# paper anyway) If you're looking for a fountain pen friendly pocket notebook (or other sizes - they have many!), and one that puts forest sustainability first, check out Forest Choice!

They are on sale at half off ($5 per 3 pack) right now at ForestChoice's website.

Keegan

[jimhughes]

Holy smokes. What a treat. You have done the FPN World a great service and my Bank account is the poorer for it. I'm in your debt. Much appreciated, great review, photo's and comparisons were as perfect as life gets. Happy Easter, Jim

[inkypete]

They look very good - thanks for the tip.