Libelle Epic

[Songwind]

Today I picked up a Libelle Epic from Ink in downtown Minneapolis.

 

It's a nice swirling "marbled" black and white on the barrel, with a black screw-on cap and silver clip and accents. The band around the cap is decorated with dragonflies.

 

The base of the barrel has a metal ring for the cap to post on, avoiding damaging the decorative finish.

 

My pen has a stainless steel nib.

 

The pin is 5.5" long capped, 6.5" posted.

 

It writes very smoothly. That's what really did me in. I wasn't really planning on buying a pen today until I put nib to paper. The medium nib writes a nice wet line without being too bold. There is no scratchiness that I can detect, either through my fingers or with my ears. It also writes well even when rotated pretty far onto either side. I even tried writing with it held upside down. It produced a line like a Fine nib, but was very scratchy.

 

The standard retail on this pen is $100. I got mine for $50, because Barry is closing out stock on them. It was more than worth the $50 I paid. I have been enjoying it so much, I make up reasons to write things.

Edited April 11, 2008 by Songwind

[Songwind]

24 Hour update/impressions:

 

Wow, this thing writes smoothly. I am a happy monkey.

 

I really like the piston converter. It seems to hold less ink than my Sheaffer aeromatic converter, but it was SO easy to clean.

 

I thought it wrote a nice line with the Purple Martin. Then I put in the bulletproof Black. That's even better.

[Songwind]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3199/2417652530_42a8074d78.jpg

[Songwind]

Well, crud.

 

The decorative cap band came off today. It's not broken, so it can be repaired, but geez.

 

Everything functional about it still works fine. It still writes great (actually, it writes even better than it did, because I found an ink that works better than the first I tried). This still makes me wonder if there are other QA issues lurking in my future?

[Vanrensalier]

Songwind,

 

I had one just like that and loved it. I gave it away to a friend thinking I'd get another one and then they were discontinued and no more to be found! I hope they re-introduce it or something similar.

 

Laban came out with the Celebration Oyster Swirl, which is kind of similar but not quite as rich looking as the Libelle.

 

Good review!

[akrishna59]

the pen looks nice and i would love some more snaps, but from what i have seen it is nice indeed. i am sure that you will be able to fix the cap band. tks. for the review.

 

rgds.

 

krishna.