I probably don’t need to tell you this, but I LOVE notebooks. I am always attracted to all sorts of notebooks. I can’t pass an office supply store without taking a look, even if I’m pretty sure the selection won’t be that interesting. Even the back to school pallets of cheap-o spiral notebooks at Staples … Continue reading Notebook Discontents and Regrets
Here’s the latest update on my daily carry notebooks, or at least frequently used notebooks. The COVID-19 pandemic means I’m not necessarily going somewhere everyday, other than for a walk around my neighborhood, so I’m not actually “carrying” my notebooks much. My most frequently used notebooks are: The 2021 Nolty Efficiency Notebook Gold, where I … Continue reading Notebooks I’m Using Now: February 2021
The MoMA website has an interesting feature on Rashid Johnson’s sketchbook practice. In a conversation with Samantha Friedman, the organizer of MoMA’s exhibition “Degree Zero: Drawing at Midcentury,” Johson talks about how he uses sketchbooks, some of the motifs in his drawings, and how the pandemic inspired him to think back to how he’d used … Continue reading Rashid Johnson’s Sketchbook
Saturn and Jupiter aren’t the only things intersecting in unusual ways this year. For me, I’m having a notebook conjunction, where my 4 daily use notebooks are all ending almost at the same time! First off, two of them are 2020 Nolty planners, so it’s not unexpected that I’d finish using both of those at … Continue reading The December 2020 Conjunction
Over the last couple of years, I haven’t had a full time job. But when I did have one, my life was full of meetings where I took notes in notebooks, calls during which I doodled in notebooks, and responsibilities that forced me to write long to-do lists in notebooks. I tended to use larger … Continue reading New Job, New Notebook
A good friend of mine has become a big fountain pen fan, and told me she’s been using the Exceed notebook from Walmart. She said it was a fountain pen friendly notebook at a bargain price, so of course I was intrigued! She was kind enough to send me two of them as a gift, … Continue reading Exceed Notebook Review
Sometimes people find their way to my website by searching for a bygone notebook brand that has left few other traces online. Often they are looking to replace a long discontinued notebook, and I’m sorry not to be able to help. But sometimes I actually can provide answers! I recently received a message from someone … Continue reading A Great-Grandfather’s 1953 Marquette Diary
The Pilot B7 Binder notebook is another Japanese “system organizer” type looseleaf that I ordered at the same time as my Raymay Davinci notebook. I love this format of slim pocket sized binder! The Pilot B7 Binder is a pocket sized looseleaf notebook. It comes packaged in a clear plastic slipcover that allows you to … Continue reading Pilot B7 Binder Notebook Review
The folks at Rollo London have continued to expand their product line, and recently introduced the Otto collection of notebooks. Let’s take a look at the sample Otto notebook they sent me: This is another pretty standard A5 format notebook. Like Rollo’s Hardy notebook I previously reviewed, the Otto notebook has a hard cover, ribbon … Continue reading Rollo London Otto Notebook Review
I was very pleased to get my shipment of 2021 Nolty diaries straight from Japan in mid-September. Ordering directly from JMAM worked great! Because I was buying multiple notebooks, the shipping costs worked out well, but if I’d only ordered one or two notebooks, I might have been better off paying Kinokuniya’s higher retail prices … Continue reading 2021 Nolty Diaries Arrived!