Is My Moleskine Just Poor Quality?

[sansenri]

Their paper is horrible and uneven in quality as they use the cheapest of the cheap. Rhodia, Quo Vadis, Clairefontaine, White Lines, Tomoe, Paperblanks, Leuchteurm (hope I spelled that right), and many of the Japanese brands are good. Drop to the ink review threads and you’ll see what people tend to use in their reviews.

 

Don’t struggle with bad paper. Life is too short.

 

Absolutely true. Italians have a tradition on making paper (think Fabriano) but Moleskine is a marketing idea, built exploiting the fact that (from wikipedia) "notebooks with similar characteristics as the current Moleskine notebooks, were already widespread in Europe in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries thanks to artisan work of a French bindery shop who supplied the Paris stationery stores. It is documented by art collections and museums, that these notebooks were widely used by the artists of the historical avant-gardes in search of agile instruments to paint and write while they were on the streets, in cafes, on the road. Among the artists of the past who used similar black notebooks Oscar Wilde, Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway and Henri Matisse. The Moleskine notebook was expressly designed on the model of the notebooks that Bruce Chatwin took with him on his travels.

 

The name "Moleskine" appears in the work Le vie dei canti (1986), in which Chatwin tells the story of his notebook supplier, a stationer in the Rue de l'Ancienne Comédie in Paris, from whom he learned in 1986 that the last producer, a small family-run company from Tours, had stopped production, following the death of the owner.

 

In 1997, Modo & Modo Spa, a small company based in Milan, decided to revive this type of notebook, register the Moleskine brand and send 5,000 pieces to production." Commercial success was fast and Moleskine is now an international brand and business.

 

Regretfully the paper used is to say the least not fountain pen friendly (but let me say openly, bad/cheap quality, italians know how to make much better quality paper).

 

I bought my first Moleskine around 2007: it was a good product then.

Bought another every year, up until I believe 2013: a blank one, inspired by some photographs I saw in a Moleskine community site which I sadly forgot, where people used to share their creativity much like Instagram. Except they photographed Moleskines.

 

I remember that mine was horrible: very thin paper, it didn't like gel pens which was everything I used back then; yet the paper was so smooth that ballpoints had problems with it.

I asked the community what was wrong with it, and the answer prompted me to switch to another product: "you are supposed to write with a pencil on your moleskine"

 

Yes, the main excuse is "that Moleskine should be used with a pencil" (I can just see the marketing people coming up with this reply to customer complaints...).

I am not really fond of Leuchteurm quality either, it's better than Moleskine but does bleed thorugh.

Reality is the best quality paper manufacturer in Europe is Clairfontaine, which if I am not wrong actually supplies its paper for Rhodia, Quo Vadis and probably a few other notebook brands this side of the Ocean.

Their paper is white, good gram weight and smooth. I love it and make stock whenever I find it (for some people it's too smooth).

[Orthostylos]

Just jotted some notes in an A5 Moleskine Ruled notebook I had in the bottom drawer, using pens on my desk.

 

- Sailor 1911 with HF nib - Scratchy feel, and significant show through

 

-Platinum 3776 with EF nib - Scratchy feel on the paper, with less show through

 

-Pilot VP with F nib - Smoother feeling and no significant show through

 

-Nemosyne 0.6 mm italic - Bleeding profusely, and a lot of show through

 

 

Bottom line, I should either put it back in the bottom drawer, or just not use with fountain pens.

[Dip n Scratch]

I had a M*******e for noting film developer recipes development, times from experimentation with said recipes etc. It is like the paper from a cheap exercise book. Considering that you pay a premium price for the damned things. How do they get away with paper that's so bad?

I resorted to a dip pen and pure iron-gall ink. Obviously they never expected that anyone would use a fountain pen.

 

The same book binding around Clairfontaine paper...... I've used the paper in Rhodia pads and Europa ring-bound notebooks. You have to be really heavy-handed or have a super-juicy pen to get show-through with that, wheras normal writing with bog-standard Herbin ink will show-through all over the reverse side of the page of a Moleskine.

You say Leuchturm has the same issues? Ouch! At least I didn't pay full price for it.

 

Apologies to any German readers. There is no character map allowing me to select a u with the umlaut.

Edited September 18, 2018 by Dip n Scratch

[FOUR X FOUR]

Their paper is horrible and uneven in quality as they use the cheapest of the cheap. Rhodia, Quo Vadis, Clairefontaine, White Lines, Tomoe, Paperblanks, Leuchteurm (hope I spelled that right), and many of the Japanese brands are good. Drop to the ink review threads and you’ll see what people tend to use in their reviews.

 

Don’t struggle with bad paper. Life is too short.

Amen.

[FOUR X FOUR]

After all this time, I’m surprised that Moleskine hasn’t entered the FP friendly arena.

[sansenri]

Well it's not overly surprising, fountain pens are not part of their business strategy, as you will note, they do not sell fountain pens in their brand shops, and I am sure a relatively small number of FP users, vs a large number of ballpoint and pencil user clients which do not notice the difference, makes no significant difference to their business results, so it may not be worth the investment in better quality paper. They will not get sufficient return on investment.

It's sad but that's business.

 

PS

by the way I still use some of their notebooks, mostly because I like the format of the smaller ones, I write on one side of the page only...

and use F nibs

Edited September 18, 2018 by sansenri

[AlohaLani787]

This is an example of what happens when one uses fountain pens on Moleskine and the reason why I use it only with rollerballs.

 

From the top down, the nibs used were: OBB, OBI, OB, OBI, F, F. Even the second to last F looks worse in person than it does in the photo.

 

Moleskine and fountain pens? Just say no.

 

Edited September 25, 2018 by AlohaLani787

[BaronWulfraed]

Well, I just sacrificed a Moleskine to a small test. {I don't write enough to justify the collection I have -- they just seem to jump into my arms as I carry a load of books to the register at Barnes&Noble}. Most of my notes get taken on Levenger 3x5" cards in a "pocket briefcase".

 

Other than where I dotted "i"s, Platinum Carbon Black had no real bleed through (however, the /contrast/ of the deep black in bright light does make it nearly visible). Platinum Forest Black and Cassis Black in a pair of Noodlers pens, and even applying some pressure in an attempt to produce some flex, had just one dot of bleed through

 

Fahrney's (Private Reserve era) Orange Crush, an old Levenger Smoky, and Levenger Claret (or is it Shiraz), bled through -- but no where as extreme as your example.

 

Strangely, Fahrney's/PR Copper Burst didn't bleed through; the back side of the page is as clean as the Platinum iron gall inks.

[AlohaLani787]

 

Fahrney's (Private Reserve era) Orange Crush, an old Levenger Smoky, and Levenger Claret (or is it Shiraz), bled through -- but no where as extreme as your example.

 

 

 

I would have claimed my bleed through was caused by using wider nibs, but then the fine disproved that theory. Perhaps it was the ink then - all Montblanc. The wide nibs are wet writers, but not excessively so. The fine are definitely not.

[BaronWulfraed]

Nasty cell-phone photos -- edited for size and to put front and back into one image... Though I suspect my handwriting is the real offense here

 

http://wlfraed.home.netcom.com/Moleskine_Ink.jpg

As stated, the opacity of the paper is a bit low, so the darker writing is visible /through/ the paper, but the only blatant bleed-through were Orange Crush, Smokey, and Shiraz/Claret.

 

Would you believe the nib used for the Copper Burst is marked B? While the Forest Black, Cassis Black, OC, and Smokey were in various Noodlers pens, so on the F side of nib sizes.

[amper]

Moleskine products are pretty to look at, but overpriced and poor quality. I bought a few several years ago, but I'd never buy another.

[meiers]

I use Moleskine notebooks and yes there is some bleed-through. The benefit of this absorbent paper is that there is less smudging. 

[Plume145]

Man, those old threads are a bummer. Could've helped OP 'cause I've been there and I've come up with a bunch of tricks to get fancy paper affordably. Might not be exactly the same 'cause I'm EU located and he's not, but still...anyways, hopefully he found it in the meantime 🤷‍♀️