A reader pointed me to Baron Schwartz’s excellent comparison of a lot of different notebook brands he tried while searching for “the Holy Grail of notebooks.” Here’s some of them, along with his handy list of what they are: An Italian leatherette journal by Markings A Semikolon Il Creativo, large A Quo Vadis Habana An … Continue reading Notebook Addict of the Week: Baron Schwartz
A nice look at the history of the ubiquitous marbled composition book. I haven’t actually used one in years, but I love them nonetheless! Reading this made me want to buy one! “Artist Jean-Michel Basquiat sketched in marble composition books, and Italian architect Ettore Sottsass used the covers to make furniture. Marble notebooks also furnish … Continue reading In Praise of the Basic Composition Book
This week’s addict emailed me photos of her notebook collection: Hi, my name is Mary and these are my notebooks: I guess you could say I’m addicted to them. I mean, everybody needs a notebook sometimes, right? If I didn’t have these, I wouldn’t have anyplace to write stuff down. I wrote something in this … Continue reading Notebook Addict of the Week: Mary
This week’s addict came to me via a tip from a reader (Thanks Raymond!), and I was delighted to see this story: Nancy Hanst has kept a food diary since 1962. I love Nancy’s stacks of little spiral-bound notebooks, and her consistency in keeping them for over 50 years! From Nancy’s article: So, here … Continue reading Notebook Addict of the Week: Nancy Hanst
Mike Sheehan shares his excellent sketches documenting the Murrieta immigration protests: David is excited that the “Trapper Keeper lives!”. Renee shares the story of a teacher who is looking for donations of journals for her students. She successfully collected 100 journals for the 2013-2014 school year, and now she needs to do it again! Please … Continue reading From Our Readers
Some of the notebooks I’ve spotted on recent shopping trips, first these “Carnets de Poche” at a gift shop in Bethesda, MD. They’re a bit large to really fit in your poche, perhaps, but rather cute nonetheless, with a nice mix of papers inside: I was quite intrigued by these Mead planners I saw … Continue reading Notebook Sightings
This week’s addict blogs at xaprb, where he’s done an in-depth comparison of various notebooks to find the brand that works best for him. Here are the candidates: And here are the criteria: So what do I want? The size. It needs to be large enough to write on easily, leaving readable margins, without wasting … Continue reading Notebook Addict of the Week: Baron Schwartz
From Jennie, a link to an article with some more great reasons to favor paper over digital note-taking: “The notebook has an immediate tactile advantage over phones: they aren’t connected to the Internet. It’s intimate in a way computers aren’t. A notebook has never interrupted me with a screen that says, “Wuz up?†Notebooks are … Continue reading More Good Stuff from Our Readers
This week’s addict also emailed me photos of her excellent notebook collection, with some commentary: I enjoy pocket journals, the saddest part is that they run out of pages so soon and I always feel like I’m abandoning a best friend when I have to start a new one. My pet peeve is that I … Continue reading Notebook Addict of the Week: DreamerO
This week’s addict is Chelcee, who emailed me these photos of her notebook collection, with lots of information about how she uses them. (Please note the lime green numbers in the lower left hand corners of the photos.) A little about me, my name is Chelcee. I’m 21 and I’d very much consider myself a … Continue reading Notebook Addict of the Week: Chelcee