Designing Pens

making pens
Making Pens
making pens
making pens
"High quality designer pens are appreciated writing tools despite the overall decline of using fountain pens."

The luxury of writing

Writing is still for many a way to express style, uniqueness, a way to impress or to create something that is very personal, especially with a fountain pen. Signing an important document is still done with a designer pen on high quality paper by Presidents, Royalties, the Rich Business owners, Solicitors and in Registrar activities, but also by people who love quality and the luxury of the art of writing. The writing style expresses the personality who writes and signs, this is often deliberately well chosen using a special colour and line width. A new generation started using fountain pens to draw with, rather then a calligraphy pen, and they make marvelous drawings doodling on a grand scale to flee away from the digital restless world.

A few people started making fountain pens again after the collapse of the large industries and try to express their own ideas and emotions. Some create truly stunning objects which have become more like art expressions. The high quality fountain pen designs is usable art and should not be confused with kit making.
 
Thankfully there is still a lot of stock but some is no longer made. Sometimes rare stock is stil found various in sheds or storage areas, some can be £100 to £1000 for only 12 inches of material! The expensive stock is usually only combined with very special high value nibs, often with bespoke design. Another style in demand is Maki / Urushi which can have prices the value varying from £3000 to that of a luxury car... In all, there is still a large market for the fountain pen as a personal statement, a preferred instrument for writing, or as a collectors item, even as an investment!

PHI
PHI math
tubes

Designs

I create my own different styles for those who are looking for something very different and unique, to feel inspired, to impress and to enjoy.

Overtime I developed my own methods to create the pens sharing the passion of lovely usable artwork. A lot of the work involves gathering knowledge of lost skills.

My pens are between 14 to 15.3mm in diameter and usually between 137.5mm to 140mm in lenght. After two years I was able to create pens without any glues, the pens are held together by compression and can contain up to 25 parts. Occasionally I use shellac for small inserts.
The metal decorations are turned by myself on the lath and as much as possible held together on the pen by compression. It's requires working to a tolerance of 0.05mm to join the parts such that friction keeps it together. 

I make the pen tubes myself which fits nicely and to be used as a carrier. I do not provide luxery pen boxes which are usually disappearing in a cupboard, A pen tube makes more sense and is more ecological. Since June 2023 I had to make a change no longer selling the pen tubes as included with the pens due to the rising costs, it is now an optional purchase.

One feature of the designs is that I try to use phi ratio's as a base for the designs and a set of base numbers. Phi is a special number which makes it rather easy to find a balance between different parts pleasing the eye. And it is fun to play with numbers.

I specialize in more robust designs which also brings out the wonderful textures and colours of the precious materials. There are many ways to make a fine product, a lot is based on experimenting, sensing, sound, feel, how it cuts, even smells.

In my designs I use currently no clips, I'm planning to design my own roll stoppers and other decorative metals on top of the pen body besides the usual embedded materials such as rings and wire designs, but this is still in development. Pens are made as a unique single design or in small series. Each item is handmade and sold as an unique pen even when a small edition was made of the same model.

I'm always exploring new ideas but try to come with something unique, which is very hard given that worldwide there are over ten's of thousand designs available. Who would ever thought you can create so many designs based on a simple structure as a pen. And yet there is always room for a few more new designs.

Hand work, no mass production
The products are made in small batches. I only have a small few in the webshop and make them on demand. That way I can follow the demand, and maintain a more ecological way of producing.

nfc additions

Certificates and Provenance

From 1 Sept 2021 I add a nfc tag in the pen and certificate which is used for authenticity and provenance. This can be checked on the NFC certification page.

Reselling to someone else:
Provenance only works when the prevenance link is not broken. If you ever sell the pen to someone else, then please contact me. Next ask the new owner to contact me with your SKU number and I can gave the next owner a new certificate.

Older Certificates.
The certificates page related to paper certificates from before January 2020 have been removed, a request for authenticy/provenance can be requested via the the contact form. I will then contact you via email and ask you to sent an image of the certificate showing the SKU number and model.

Packaging

Packaging
I love to design and make things myself, which is way more satisfying then outsourcing. The postage box has now a nice insert with the certificate under the insert. Very simple and makes it stylish showing the brand logo. I'm still busy with the rebranding, so the logo will become the one new one seen on the website.