I’ve been paying a fair amount of attention to Moleskine notebooks for many years, so I sometimes think I can’t possibly discover anything new and interesting to say about them. Yet once in a while I discover some limited edition or series that I had never noticed. The Moleskine Zoom collection was one, and I recently came across another: a Moleskine Touch notebook.
This was an eBay find– I wasn’t even quite sure what I was going to get, as the item description had some incorrect info, but I could see in the listing photos that this Moleskine notebook seemed to have a grey flannel-like cover. The band mentioned a limited edition of “four pleasant textures.”
The design of the packaging indicated that this would probably have been from the late 1990s or early aughts. It’s definitely from before 2006, as it says Modo e Modo inside, and the back cover shows Kikkerland as their distributor, a relationship I believe ended in 2008. The booklet inside is also consistent with other examples that date to the very early 2000s, probably pre-2002. (See my previous post with more details on The Evolution of Moleskine Notebook Packaging.)
The notebook came in a translucent plastic slipcover. It’s an interesting choice– if it was for protection, they could have just shrinkwrapped it like other Moleskines. But I guess they wanted people to be able to touch all the Touch notebooks! The texture is indeed pleasant– it’s actually felt, a bit rougher than flannel. The fabric adds some bulk to the covers, making it quite a lot thicker than other Moleskine notebooks with the same page count. The insides are exactly the same as any other Moleskine of the time.
The only other trace of this collection that I could find was this page on Lovenotebooks.com: Moleskine Special Edition Touch Address Books . You can see all four textures that were originally offered– in addition to felt, there was Crocodile (faux, obviously), Dots (not sure what it’s actually made of but it seems to be fabric of some sort), and Woven (seems to actually be woven strips of faux-leather).
This collection isn’t as interesting to me as the Zoom Moleskines, but I like that it’s a relatively understated variation on the classic black Moleskine theme. And it’s always fun to find something old and yet new, at least to me– a relic from the early days of the Moleskine brand.
I haven’t done a Notebook Addict of the Week post in a while, so it was great to hear from Joey, who sent some photos of these beautiful spreads:
I love all the color and textures! If you check out Joey’s Instagram (@magician_menace), you’ll see even more use of these natural forms and dense patterns and sinuous shapes in multi-media artworks and amazing masks. Joey is obviously a very talented , imaginative and prolific artist!
Joey says:
I use a variety of different notebooks for arts-research! I like to combine writing and drawing to see what emerges, like having a conversation with myself across time. Sort of ‘chewing’ on ideas, letting them grow across pages and notebooks until I can tease the threads of the work out into something bigger. I feel like a notebook is my most used tool as an artist and writer, it lets me tinker, and play with all the shiny things like a magpie!
The notebooks I use vary, a lot of them I get rather cheaply at thrift stores or out of clearance racks at TK Maxx, I was using these but they reduced the quality of them by half, I also hand bind my own books when I want something chunky. Art mediums I use are dip pen and acrylic ink, drawing pens and watercolour.
I’ve never seen the brand Joey linked to, called Elements of Art– looks like it is an Australian brand that’s made in China. It’s always so frustrating when a favorite brand suddenly changes their quality!
I’m grateful to Joey for submitting these fascinating sketchbooks and reminding me that I should be posting notebook addicts more often! If you’d like to be considered as a Notebook Addict of the Week yourself, you can reach me via the contact form at the top of the page. I love getting submissions!
The article, by Molly Young, is about her reading and writing habits during her pregnancy. She managed to write a 295,233 word Google Doc. And her reading included a book called The Midnight Disease: The Drive to Write, Writer’s Block, and the Creative Brain, by Alice Flaherty, which talks about a medical condition known as hypergraphia.
Hypergraphia is the compulsion to write excessively and without obvious purpose or profit. Hypergraphics tend to exhibit flamboyant penmanship and fill every inch of space on a page. They favor colored inks and CAPITAL LETTERS. They write in response to internal rather than external pressures — so, not to achieve tenure or impress girls. And their writing must be coherent. That is, it must rise above sheer orthographic compulsion, must express more than a third grader’s cursive worksheet.
I have to admit that I felt a little shiver of self-recognition in that– and might not we all, those of us who love our notebooks and pens? I’ve often felt like I just want to write and doodle in notebooks without even really needing to, without a purpose other than to fill pages. It’s just because I like to write (and draw)–I like notebooks and pens, and I like the experience of using them. My enjoyment of using them is sometimes out of line with my actual need to use them, or any true creative production.
However, I don’t think most of us would truly qualify as compulsive writers at the level of true hypergraphia. The article says that “Flaherty reserves the label of clinical hypergraphia for those with known or likely temporal lobe abnormalities — the best-understood causes.” Hypergraphia can also be part of a manic episode or other mood disorders. And perhaps this association is why, as the article points out, the most prolific writers like Joyce Carol Oates or John Updike are sometimes looked down upon for spewing out such a high volume.
But perhaps there’s a spectrum of hypergraphia? Is there something in our brains that makes all of us love writing to various degrees, and sometimes too much? If someone did a study of the notebook and pen communities, would they find a neurological thing we all have in common, to varying degrees? I would love to know!
Here’s a gorgeous little antique notebook that I recently added to my collection.
At over a century old, it is still in pretty good shape! The cover seems to be some kind of faux leather wrapped around cardboard, with the year stamped in gold. The pages have gilt edges, rather faded now. Another nice little detail is the green and yellow headbands. There is an elastic that has lost its stretchiness, and a loop for a small pencil. The notebook measures about 3 x 5″.
Inside the front cover are these beautiful marbled endpapers. The colors are still so vibrant. The same endpapers repeat inside the back cover, where they are also used to form an expanding pocket. I like the red cloth gussets on the pocket– they complement the marbled paper nicely. The same red cloth was used to bind the page block to the covers, as you can see a sliver of it between the endpapers– this in itself is an unusual way to bind a notebook, as usually the same endpaper sheet goes across the whole inside cover spread.
The pages of the diary are all squared with a 4mm grid. I would not be surprised if the manufacturer just made lots of book blocks with this grid paper, and then either sold them that way with blank covers, or put on dated covers and stamped the pages inside with diary-specific layouts. The printed pages begin with a lovely Art Nouveau style front page and a list of all the saints’ days, then continue with calendar pages with 2 days per page. There are a couple of blank pages at each end, but otherwise, that’s it– a very straightforward and simple diary.
The person who owned this notebook seems to have used it mainly for recording finances, as there are entries on some days that seem to note money spent and received. The handwriting varies, sometimes a spidery small script in ink, and sometimes larger scrawls in pencil. The variety is so wide, I almost wonder if this diary was used by more than one person. I can’t decipher most of the writing, but the words “payer” (to pay) and “achete” (buy) and “donne” (give) repeat quite often. The word “hemoglobine” also appeared, which made me wonder if the owner was a doctor, but I didn’t notice any other medical terms. Amongst other things, I saw what seemed to be expenditures for coal and oil, sponges and a “foot brush” and a note about a professor of gymnastics.
There are several loose receipts folded into the notebook, which would also indicate that it was used to keep track of purchases. The receipts all seem to be for groceries, as far as I can tell. The addresses seem to indicate that the person lived in or near Champigny-sur-Marne or Joinville-le-Pont, a suburban area just outside Paris. I went there once myself via train, and the owner of this notebook may have taken the train sometimes too, as there is one page where the writing looks a bit shaky!
This format for diaries must have been quite common over a period of years, as I have another item in my collection of antique and vintage notebooks that is quite similar in many ways, but with some interesting differences: an 1898 Agenda Notebook from France.
I love finding little gems like this– so similar to today’s notebooks, and yet with so much more charm.
I snapped the photo below in the shop at the Aldrich Museum about 2 years ago and then forgot all about it til I was trying to organize my unwieldy photo archives. You can see why the photo and the book caught my eye, with that lovely pile of notebooks and sketchbooks on the cover!
The book is about the artist Mark Dion‘s works on paper: Mark Dion: Journals, Photographs, Souvenirs and Trophies. I can’t remember if I saw his work at the museum that day, but I’m sure I didn’t see any sketchbooks on display or I would have taken photos of those too!
It’s probably hard to see in the photo, but the spines of some of the notebooks seem to indicate they were journals kept during travels to Mexico, Nicaragua, Borneo, Brazil and Guyana.
I did snap a couple of pictures of the interior of the book. Many of the pages seemed to be from notebooks full of writing, rather than sketchbooks. But I’m not surprised, as Dion’s work is more conceptual. I think I’ve seen some of his work in other museums, and a lot of it seems to involve collections of artifacts. I tend to enjoy artworks like this, as they make me feel like I’m browsing really cool stuff in an antique store while also contemplating a work of art!
Evie Riski’s father gave her a diary so she could follow his tradition of recording the day’s events in her hometown. It was a week before her 11th birthday.
Nine decades and almost 33,000 entries later, Riski is still at it, journaling every night before bedtime in her independent living apartment in Lakota, N.D., about 20 miles from where she grew up in Niagara.
Riski, who turned 100 last month, has not missed a single day of writing since her first diary entry on Jan. 1, 1936.
I just loved this story– talk about consistency! And I liked seeing that she stores her diaries in much the same way I do, dating them on the edge, though it looks like she dates hers on the top edge and I date mine on the bottom edge.
One thing that surprised me was that there were a few negative reader comments on the Post article, rather snidely saying that Riski’s diary entries weren’t very substantive or reflective. The examples shown were all from her childhood, so you’d think people would be a little more understanding that a 10-year old didn’t spend a lot of time writing about world events and her place in history. But I also think these comments point to a misunderstanding of the difference in keeping a diary vs. a journal.
The terms diary and journal tend to be used interchangeably, (including in the quote above) but a diary is usually a record of events– brief notes about what happened on a certain day. That seems to be the format Riski has consistently employed, often in small diaries with only a few lines per day. (Similar to the Harvard Coop diaries I used when I was that age.) But a journal is a more expansive kind of diary, with longer form entries that are more descriptive of thoughts or feelings. My own notebooks usually involve a combination of diary-ish entries and journaling. There’s no right or wrong way to do it– if writing a few simple lines about your daily activities feels right and is satisfying, it’s nothing to feel guilty about. Sometimes these simple little records of our lives may be just as interesting and valuable as multi-page deconstructions of every little thing we felt.
Do read the whole Washington Post article– at age 100, Evie Riski’s joy in a lifetime of notebook-keeping shines through.
I recently watched a documentary about Brian Eno, which was streamed online as part of a 24-hour event where you could watch it up to 6 times. Each showing is different, generated randomly from hundreds of hours of interview footage from across Eno’s career– a very long and interesting career including his time as a glam rocker in Roxy Music, his work as a producer for artists like David Bowie, Talking Heads, and U2, and his solo work, including the ambient music he is now best known for. Some of his own music is generated using algorithms, in a similar way to how the documentary was produced.
Back in the 1990s, a friend gave me some cassette tapes of Eno’s early solo albums from the 1970s, such as Before and After Science. I haven’t listened to them in a long time, and I never really got into his ambient music, but after seeing the documentary, I want to revisit all his music as well as his writing. He has a lot of interesting thoughts about art and creativity, and guess what– he seems to have captured a lot of his ideas in notebooks!
I watched the documentary twice, and ended up being glad I did– about half of the footage I saw was repeated, but amongst the sections that were new in the second viewing, I had to snap this photo:
Screenshot from Eno by Gary Hustwit
I spy what must be a pocket sized Moleskine daily diary, and a Clairefontaine notebook, but I’m not sure what the other brands might be. The whole collection seems to span decades, as you can see dates from the 1970s written in white on some of the spines.
It’s tantalizing to see all those notebooks strewn over his desk, as he didn’t talk about them at all! That portion was focused on his “Oblique Strategies” card deck, a set of aphorisms that are meant to be used as creative prompts. But I suspect that some iterations of the documentary probably would include more discussion of the notebooks, based on this image from Brian Eno’s Facebook page:
According to this Medium article, Eno is a prolific keeper of visual diaries.
Even though Eno primarily makes music, he probably has kept more visual diaries than most of the artists who make visual art. In his notebooks, he kept everything from ideas of how to make an installation, to experience throughout a particular day, to reminders of dentist appointments.
“It’s the act of writing something down, that puts it into memory, takes it out of my mind, where it’s possible to think about it differently.”
Excerpt from Brian Eno’s notebook, 1970s, as show in Medium post by Ningxia Zhang
Here’s another image of some of Brian Eno’s notebooks from a fan site:
There are also some shown on the homepage of EnoShop.co.uk. If you click on the notebooks, it leads you to a quote about how Eno uses notebooks, which unfortunately is rather hard to read, at least to my eyes!
The best ways to learn more about Brian Eno’s notebooks are probably these books:
Brian Eno: Visual Music: this book is about Eno’s visual art, which looks like it includes some images of notebook pages.
What Art Does: this book (forthcoming in the US, already available in the UK) also looks interesting, even though it isn’t particularly about Eno’s notebooks.
All this makes me a little frustrated– the concept of the documentary being patched together so it’s different each time is cool, but I wish there was also a way to search for particular topics of interest! I don’t want to have to watch the same documentary millions of times in hopes of catching the one segment I’m looking for. In any case, I’m glad I watched it, and it inspired me to jot some ideas in my own notebook. I don’t know if it will be available for streaming again soon, but keep an eye out, it’s definitely worth watching if you have any interest in Brian Eno’s work.
I’ve been looking forward to reading Roland Allen’s book “The Notebook” ever since I first heard about it. I mean, a book about the history of the notebook, what’s not to like? And yet, when I looked at the table of contents and started flipping through the book, I wondered if I would find it disappointing. So much of the history seemed to date back to earlier centuries and I wasn’t sure how interested I would be in the parts covering, say, the invention of accounting in the year 1299.
But I was so wrong! The invention of accounting turned out to be really interesting, because Roland Allen is a great storyteller who knows how to bring history to life. I ended up being completely fascinated and entertained by the way he recounts the history of how and why people started keeping notes and how the notebook developed as a physical object, from wax tablets written on with styli, to papyrus and parchment, to the arrival of paper, whose lower cost made it more widely accessible.
The early chapters of the book take us through the gradual adoption and popularization of notetaking on paper, from financial record-keeping, to household use. You may think you already know some of this story, but this book makes it feel fresh and new. For instance, I’d read about the concept of a zibaldone before, but I learned so much more about them here– more than just a commonplace book, a zibaldone was sort of like a cross between Pinterest and Facebook bound into a book, as these highly personal collections of family history, handy information, quotations, and jokes would be passed along in families and showed to friends, who might then copy a favorite item into their own zibaldone. They were recreational, kept for fun, unlike commonplace books, which tended to be more systematic and organized, and used as a substitute for memorization.
My dog-eared, marked-up copy!
The Notebook goes on to trace many other uses of notebooks, from ships’ logs to scientific observation and cataloging nature, sketching, friendship albums and autograph books, and more. The history brings us right to the present day, covering the genesis of the Moleskine brand and the Bullet Journal method. Allen concludes with some really eye-opening observations about the notebook as a “cognitive technology,” arguing that a notebook becomes an extension of our minds. Using a notebook can actually change our brains.
If I have to quibble with anything about this book, it’s just that I wished there was MORE of it! I would have liked to see more information about how notebooks were used in cultures outside Europe and North America, and more attention to specific physical forms and brands of notebooks. Other than Moleskine and Letts diaries, the book mostly focuses on how people used their notebooks rather than why they chose particular designs or makers. Filofax is mentioned as a mere footnote, which seems like a big omission. I would also have liked to read more about how children use notebooks, and more about notebooks as a commercial product. The book also lacks a bibilography, though there are lots of references to sources in the endnotes. (This blog was cited!)
So yes, it would have been great if The Notebook was an even more comprehensive history. But hey, I’ve been blogging about notebooks for over 16 years and still haven’t run out of things to say, so I can understand that you can’t always fit everything into a book– at least not a reasonably sized book that most people would be willing to buy and read. Maybe he left enough material on the cutting room floor for a volume 2! But nevertheless, as it is, The Notebook is a hugely satisfying and enjoyable read, and I highly recommend it.
At some point in the last few months, I hinted that I’d be trying something new this year for the notebook that I use for my job. After many years of consistently using large-ish wire-o bound notebooks (see examples in these posts: Finishing a Work Notebook , My Latest Work Notebooks, New Job, New Notebook), last year I used a pocket size Pagem planner (see 2024 Pagem Planner Review) and quite enjoyed it. It made me realize I could make do with a smaller page size, and since I had a nice pocket size Filofax that I wanted to use more actively, (see Vintage Filofax Modification) I decided to make that my work notebook for 2025.
I bought a calendar insert for the pocket Filofax and already had it sitting on my desk, eager and ready to go… but the more I thought about it, the more I started to realize that a pocket Filofax page layout might just be too small. You can see below how it compares to the Pagem layout I was using.
Since I only work 3 days a week, I wasn’t too worried about fitting in all my daily appointments, but I do tend to have a long list of to-do items that goes on the facing page, and it started to feel like that wouldn’t work. Though I’d like to be the kind of person who accomplishes all her tasks and never has more to do than my tiny handwriting could cram into that size page, I’m not. I do procrastinate about certain things and tend to have long-term items that gather up and get rolled over from week to week, so the pocket Filofax layout felt like it would be cramped.
I also wanted to keep my notes for meetings and projects in the same notebook. One of the nice things about a refillable notebook was that I’d be able to move pages around, filing meeting notes in a section devoted to a particular project, or perhaps inserting them within a particular week of the calendar. When I’m rapidly scribbling notes during a meeting, my handwriting gets bigger and messier, and I need more space. That was a major reason why I was always using notebooks that were at least 7×9″ all those years. When I was using the Pagem planner, I wrote some notes in the blank pages at the beginning and end, but I ended up having a separate desktop notebook that I used for meeting notes.
So I was in this dither about what to do, but then I had an epiphany when I was playing with my friend’s Filofax Winchester from the 1980s: moving up to a personal size Filofax would give me the space I needed.
Ever since buying my first pocket Filofax in the early 1990s, I’d never really given much thought to the larger models. They seemed too big to carry around, and I didn’t care for the snap fasteners. And I’m just too loyal to my favorite size! But I did appreciate the beautiful leathers they were made with, and I remembered noticing that some of them had cute, tiny pockets for stamps. While researching older Filofaxes, I realized that there were some personal size models that didn’t have snap fasteners. So I set my sights on what I thought would be the perfect Filofax for my purposes, and I managed to buy one: the Gloucester, from the mid-1980s.
This Filofax Gloucester is what they’d now call a “compact” model, because it has half-inch rings, rather than the more typical 7/8″ rings found on most personal size organizers. One side has the little stamp pockets, and on the other side, there are two full length pockets, one gusseted. This design seems to have been around for a while before the 1980s heyday of Filofax organizers– in the catalog archive at Philofaxy, an early version with model #A299 is shown in a 1979 catalog. The A299 model number also appears, described with the same features, in a catalog estimated to be from 1937, though there is no picture. In the 1984 catalog, the Gloucester is noted as being a “traditional design.”
The nice thing about this Filofax is that the branding and model number (updated in the ’80s to 6CL1/2, for 6 pockets, made of CaLf leather, and 1/2″ rings) is stamped on it sideways, and the pockets all run sideways, so you can decide for yourself which pockets you want in the front or the back and it will never be upside-down. This one is in very good used condition–there are signs of wear, but it was well cared for and the minor scuffs and stains don’t bother me in the least. The leather is elegant but also quite thick and rugged– I don’t know if anyone even makes small leather goods with materials of this quality anymore, and if they do, I’m sure they cost a fortune.
For inserts, I got myself a Plotter bible size calendar and grid paper pad, and also decided to try some RayMay DaVinci paper. The dividers are original Filofax dividers from the early 1990s. The half-inch rings are quite full with this set up, so I may end up removing the alphabetized address section. (After writing this post, I realized that the calendar included extra weekly pages for the first 3 months of 2026, so I took those out to make a little more room.) I’ve been keeping the Plotter grid pad on my desk– the nice thing about Plotter papers is that they’re glue-bound like a notepad. It’s sometimes handy to be able to write on the top sheet of the pad, and then insert it in the ring binder afterwards.
The calendar layout gives me room for the work week on the left, and a blank page for to-do’s on the right. I put a sticky note on the ruler that aligns with my work days and reminds me of standard repeating tasks for those days. I love Plotter’s aesthetic, but I kind of wish this calendar was designed a bit differently. Mainly I just wish each spread spelled out the name of the month instead of just having a “1” in the corner for January, etc., but I’d also prefer a more clear layout– still minimal, but without some of the little marks and icons.
I keep blank paper for random notes in the “notes” section. I have a page each for various repeating meetings and ongoing projects in the “projects” section. In “information” I have a list of passwords and some other reference pages. The “financial” section is empty, and so far, the addresses section is empty. But I may add some contact info there. And maybe move my meetings and projects to the alphabetized sections so I can jump to particular pages more easily.
The Gloucester looks huge next to my pocket Grosvenor, but it’s actually not that big. The whole thing fits nicely on my desk and lies open pretty flat– I think it will lie even flatter as I break it in with more use. I love the slim size and it will be nicely portable on the rare occasions that I’m working somewhere other than home. But I do wish I had room for more pages, so I may consider archiving the calendar pages for past weeks, or using a different, thinner calendar next year. If I end up deciding I need more space, I may try another Filofax with larger rings. Maybe I’ll even go further out of my comfort zone and consider one with a pen loop and fastener! [gasp]
It’s only been a couple of weeks, but I think I’m going to be really happy with this set-up– it already feels like a very functional and well-organized work notebook. I don’t know what took me so long to try it!
This year, I feel like I’ve seen more Instagram and blog posts with this title than ever before. Setting up one’s planner for the coming year means different things to different people– for some, it seems to be an elaborate and labor-intensive process! I admire the creativity and care, and I’m sure beautiful, hand-crafted planner layouts give some people a lot of pleasure. I also can’t help but wonder whether the most time-consuming planner set-ups sometimes result in the least follow-through in actual planner use throughout the year. But I do think a bit of preparation can go a long way in making a planner an effective tool.
I have been using the Nolty Gold diary for several years now. It has pre-formatted pages that work well for my purposes (which involve retrospective logging as much as planning) so my “set-up” is pretty minimal. Here are my usual steps.
I’ve recently started to use the yearly page spread to pencil in a few major annual things I might need to plan around, like avoiding seasonal crunch times at work when I’m scheduling a vacation.
I add the habits I want to track to the monthly Gantt chart pages, and add additional pencil lines as needed to keep the rows straight.
I note any work holidays and pre-existing appointments in the weekly pages throughout the year, and I transfer any short-term to-do and grocery list items from the last week of the previous year to the first week of the new year.
I add pages at the end of the diary for my resolutions/goals for the year, and notes/future appointments to be added to the following year’s diary. I also close out the past year’s diary by making notes on how I did on my resolutions and goals. These pages cover things like how much money I want to save, how many books I want to read, how much weight I want to lose, and reminders about recurring household tasks like changing water filters, having the gutters cleaned out, and when to fertilize the plantings.
The Nolty diary comes with a detachable booklet in the back that I use for long-term lists. I tend to re-use these for at least 2 years at a time, so this year, I just moved the one I’d had in my 2024 diary. Some years, I end up re-writing the lists, and archiving certain list items elsewhere. (I need to do a separate post about long-term list management, as it’s one thing I continue to struggle with in terms of finding the best balance between notebooks and electronic tools.)
Finally, I transfer odds and ends I keep tucked in the front and back of my diary– a few sticky notes, a $20 bill for emergencies, and a postage stamp or two.
And I almost forgot 2 other very basic but important steps that I usually do before I even start with anything else: I write my name and contact details inside the front cover. And I always put nail polish on the ends of the ribbon markers so they won’t fray. (I do this with any notebook that has a ribbon marker.)
That’s it! It’s pretty simple and it doesn’t take too much time. This planner set-up works well for me and I’ll keep using it til it doesn’t! I’ve written about my planner/logbook methods in the post “How I Use My Nolty Planner.”
If you’re interested in trying a Nolty planner, they seem to be getting easier and easier to order for those of us in the USA– the 2025 Nolty Gold is available on Amazon now. The Gold version is pricey due to the leather cover and gold page edges, but the ones with faux-leather plastic covers are also great, and also available on Amazon in various formats for around $20– not all have the Gantt chart, so make sure you check the specs if that’s a feature you want to use. In 2020, I made a list of various Nolty models and whether they had Gantt charts or other layouts— their model numbers stay pretty consistent from year to year so that may still be helpful.
Notebooks, journals, sketchbooks, diaries: in search of the perfect page…
