I do like Bexley pens. And one of my favourites is the Poseidon. Two of mine are shown above - one in coral, and one in tortoiseshell. The tortoiseshell is a regular, while the Cardinal Orange is a Poseidon Magnum, slightly longer (five and a half inches). The Poseidon is a nicely stubby and chunky pen. I suspect it takes some of its lines from the classic Pelikan 100 / 100N, though the filling system on most Poseidons is cartridge/converter rather than piston.  The Poseidon went through a couple of iterations: the second generation of production pens was available till quite recently ..read more

I am not the world's biggest ink collector by a long way. I have a few inks, but I'm not a collector. I'm not all that conservative with my ink choices either. I like purples, oranges, lime greens, post box reds, lurid fuchsia. I have one bottle of Quick blue-black. I probably won't get through it in my lifetime. I regard blue-black as a loathsome confidence trick. It's not black, it's not blue, and it's one of those kinds of compromises which makes life utterly unlivable. "Even in the face of Armageddon, never compromise." But I also find it difficult to give up a wad of money for an ink ..read more

I blame Brian Gray. He blames covid-19. Anyway, Edison couldn't get enough of their stunning Rock Candy material for the Collier, one of my very favourite fountain pens. Which is annoying, as so far I've held off buying one of the Rock Candies, and I really want one, but a few Pelikans and Platinums this year had nearly run me out of pen budget. But then Brian thought of the darndest thing. Instead of just picking another material to run with, he put it to a vote. I voted for subtle. That's fairly unusual for me, but I liked the 'Juniper'. I thought one of the more vivid colours would wi ..read more

In France, we've been 'unconfined' for a while now and mid sized outdoors events are beginning to occur. Which means sales! Hurrah! hurrah! But Thiron-Gardais, a little village in the middle of the Perche, produced no fountain pens. It did produce a couple of nice things, but no pens. And two hours of searching at Breval today produced an Egyptian statuette (Louvre miniature), two Burmese monks in gilded wood, some really good books and a small pestle and mortar for the kitchen.... but no pens. I was coming up to the last alley, where the path from the forest turns round and opens up on to ..read more

It's grey here. Grey every day. Sometimes, I can hardly tell dawn from a slightly less intense version of night. Grey fields, bleached stumps of colza; grey skies, with grey clouds; grey roads, grey everything. I need some sunshine in my life. Cue two pens that have brought it over the past few weeks, alongside some fine joyful inks like Diamine Autumn Oak, Papier Plume House of the Rising Sun, Roher & Klingner Fernambuk, and Herbin Orange Indien. Platinum 3776 special edition 'Apricot' (tarumi) demonstrator for Nagasawa pen shop of Kobe, Japan. I managed to secure this fine implemen ..read more

I love Bayard fountain pens - but they used some very shrinkage-prone celluloids. Yes, they're very colourful and characterful celluloids. But they shrink. Quite often you'll find a little bump around the lever axle. That's not a problem. What is a problem is that the lever won't actually close any more. There are a few things that help. First, take any rust or dirt off the sides of the lever. Micromesh or very fine (500+) sandpaper can help, but go very gently. Not recommended if you have a nice plated lever, but if it's brassed and rusty, do what it takes. Secondly, with a fine pair of ..read more

I've finally managed to make some time for pen repairs, and I've been busy pulling pens apart, and in some cases, getting them back together again. The job is complicated by the fact that so often, you think "easy, that pen looked fine, I'll just resack it" - only to find that it's missing a j-bar, missing a nib, got a crack in the barrel, a cracked nib, the lever has come adrift from its bar or c-clip, or there's some other little fault that means you'll have to put in some time on the lathe, order more components, cannibalise another pen... So I now use the pulling-apart stage as a form of ..read more