I hope everybody is enjoying the holidays. Here’s to another exciting stationery year! One of my New Year’s resolutions is to create an index page for all of the posts I’ve written up till now, as well as posting a bit more often. Stay tuned ..read more

The most recent collection of short stories by Vladimir Nabokov, incorporating thirteen new stories, was published in 2008 to great fanfare. I’m just getting around to reading it now, because it usually takes me about ten years to catch up with major literary events; plus, I can’t exactly say I was a fan of this particular writer up till now. We’ll see. Nabokov is widely known as having been a Blackwing enthusiast, and indeed his lifespan seems to have coincided with the glory days of the pencil in general. The humble instrument makes several appearances in his fiction, including the now almos ..read more

After considerable thought, I decided to get a new Hobonichi cover this year. I’ve been eyeing leather covers for some time, especially the ones produced by Arts & Science (Arts & Science is the boutique run by Sonya Park, who creates the English-language Planner); but up until last year the leather covers came with zippers and lots of sleeves – too fussy and bulky for my taste. This year the design was perfect. Coincidentally, lots of other people fell in love with this year’s A&S covers, too. The navy and grey ones sold out in a matter of hours on September 1st, and I almost mis ..read more

The other day I came across an interesting list, “50 Ways to Fill a Notebook.” The title strikes a chord with all of us stationery hoarders, surely. I read it with interest, and noted two things: 1. It included some things I would never ever use a notebook for, like gratitude journals (which is why it was interesting!), and 2. It did not include two ways I most often use a notebook for: recording books read, and looking up words in a foreign language. The latter (vocabulary lists) is, for me, by far the quickest way to use up my notebook stock, and I’ve written about it a little here, so, as a ..read more

There are tons of stationery shops in Japan, but people seem to agree on one thing: Ito-ya is still the place to go to. It is a place of pilgrimage for stationery nerds. How does it manage to stay on top? Real estate seems to be part of the answer: the sight of the red clip wedged in between jewelers and fashion labels on one of the most expensive streets in the world seems to signal that stationery is to be taken seriously and that Ito-ya is its ambassador. I don’t know if Ito-ya actually outsells everybody else in the business, but it is definitely influential, and an industry leader. In th ..read more

Tokyu Hands in Shinjuku is a fun place. Occupying seven floors off a corner of Takashimaya Times Square, it sells chic home supplies and lifestyle products, hard-to-find curiosities and sometimes just plain weird stuff. Because the store’s selection overall is so idiosyncratic, I had trouble thinking of it as a serious stationer up till now, since I’ve bought furniture and drapes there as well as pens and notebooks in the past. But to my surprise, it was one of five major stationery stores featured in the Staedtler podcast (of course, this list is far from objective, as it probably reflects St ..read more

I have a couple more things left to say about my trip to Japan, but I’d like to sneak in just one post about Crane’s, while the topic is still fresh. Crane and Co. is a venerable paper company (founded 1801) based in Dalton, Massachusetts. I lived in the Boston area as a student many years ago, and developed a fondness for this “local” brand of paper that was sold in the university co-op. (If I were ever to draw up a “bucket list,” it would include ordering a lifetime’s worth of personalized stationery from Crane’s.) However, Crane’s is very hard to get outside the United States, and expensive ..read more

Here are some new additions to my stash of Ippitsu-sen. (See my previous post for an introduction to this particular kind of Japanese correspondence paper.) There was one more pattern to complete the quartet, which I didn’t buy. (Just so you know.) I got these at Maruzen, which, had I not listened to the Staedtler Japan Radio podcast from several years ago, I would surely have left out of my to-visit list. You see, even though I was reasonably familiar with Tokyo and its stationers, I had never felt the need to distinguish one well-stocked store from another (with the possible exception of ..read more

For one reason or another, I have found myself in Japan at regular intervals throughout my life. The first couple of times it was because of my father’s job. Then I moved to Tokyo by myself to work. Later on, my husband was posted there, and we welcomed our son into the world in the port city of Yokohama. All this has led me to think of that country as a sort of second home, and my regularly timed returns have allowed me to experience it as a series of snapshots at different points in time. This summer we returned for a trip down memory lane after a hiatus of ten years. My, my, things do chang ..read more

Greetings, everyone! I have been away all July and have just come back to Montevideo. The summer was hot, humid, and inspiring; we visited family, we visited lots of hospitals and got all fixed up, and we made a long-overdue nostalgic trip to Tokyo. But before recounting my stationery adventures I must start with what I came across on the long long flight home. This incredible shot is from the Australian film Red Dog: True Blue (2016). A twelve-year-old boy is sent to live with his grandfather, near Pilbara (scorched red earth, bush and seemingly not much else), after his father dies and his ..read more