August meeting photos!

We had good turnout for our meeting held on August 18, 2016 at Perks pen store on Cambie Street in Vancouver----17 members (including three newcomers---Marzieh, Justin and Terry) showed up, as well as one out-of-town guest (Bill S. from the Seattle Pen Club).
Special thanks to David R for his generous donation of a Kaweco "Liliput" fountain pen for our door prize; the lucky winner was Christopher R!

The evening's topic was "Your Favourite Lesser-Known Fountain Pen Brands".
I snapped a few photos of the pens our members brought in for the theme, but first....these group photos, taken by our pen club host, Richard:
(~CLICK ON IMAGES TO ENLARGE~).

Back row (L to R): Glenn M, Terry, David R, Bill S (from Seattle), me (Maja), Justin, Barry K, Bethany, Ralph (in green shirt).
Middle row (L to R): Jerred, June, Bart, Louise.
Front row (L to R): Christopher R, Stuart, Marzieh, Norm.

The theme for August's meeting was Jerred's idea, so I'll start with a quick shot of the fountain pens he brought in. Pictured below (from left to right): Online Campus Red Dragon, Online Academy Soft Pink, Ohto Rook, Ohto Dude, Muji Round Aluminum, Online Vision Nature Rosewood, Online Icone Midnight and Ohto Tasche.

In the photo below, you can see Stuart's examples of his favourite lesser-known fountain pen brands---a couple of Heiko fountain pens (including a model '442') on the far left, a brown marbled Penco fountain pen next to the Heikos, two Ingersoll metal fountain pens in the middle of the photo, and two Esterbrook 'J' pens on the far right. The Wahl "All-Metal fountain pen to the right of the Penco, the Sheaffer "Balance" next to it and the Pelikan MK10 next to the Balance are all new acquisitions of Stuart's.

A shot of the pens Bill brought in for our theme:
From top to bottom: Nettuno "Barracuda", Paper Mate fountain pen (nib made by Montblanc!), Giuliano Mazzuoli fountain pen, Parafernalia "Revolution" fountain pen:

My (Maja's) three favourite lesser-known fountain pen brands--from L-R: two Levenger "True Writer" fountain pens, two ThINK fountain pens (one in the "Confetti" pattern and one in the brown "Gatsby" pattern) and two Retro 51 fountain pens (a "Postmaster", made with real used postage stamps, and the "Double Eight" model in a limited edition brown marble colour and ):

I often marvel at the enthusiasm of our members. One of our members (Harry) who couldn't attend the August meeting sent in these photos of a Penol 'Ambassador Jr' as one of his favourite lesser-known fountain pen brands. As Harry writes: "I thought I'd share a few photos of one of my pens for the uncommon brands topic. The pen I'd like to share is from the Copenhagen based brand Penol. The name comes from the combination of "Penn" and "Olson", and was made by the Christian Olson factory. Olson was the Parker distributor for Scandinavia from before WW1 until late in the century. The pen model is Ambassador Jr, and was made in November, 1942. I found it in a vintage shop in Denmark. It writes like a dream!".
Thanks for sharing this with us, Harry!

Our secondary topic is always "Newest Acquisitions". Louise and Norm brought in this older-model Delta fountain pen that Louise found (she also found a nice vintage Mabie-Todd "Swan" fountain pen, but I didn't snap a photo of it):

June's lovely collection of modern and vintage fountain pens, including her newest acquisitions, the three vintage Eversharp 'Doric' fountain pens (the 6, 7 & 8th pens from the left) and a Visconti 'Opera' (the last pen on the right-hand side).

In addition to his cool new Franklin-Christoph 6-pen "Penvelope" pen case, Bart brought in his Pelikan M800 in Burnt Orange (a newer acquisition, which he brought to the June meeting, but I forgot to photograph):

The brass Kaweco "Liliput" fountain pen that David R donated as a door prize. You can see how small the pen is, based on the size of the coin next to it.

Bill S was kind enough to bring his amazing collection of rare and hard-to-find Targa fountain fountain pens all the way from Seattle. They're on the left-hand side of the pen case below. His limited edition Sheaffers are on the right-hand side:

My apologies for the quality of the pics---the store's lights were turned off in order to keep the temperature down, as it was a very warm evening. The photo below shows Bill's "daily user" fountain pens. Many thanks, Bill, for bringing your collections for us to see!

One of our brand-new members, Terry, brought in his collection for us to see. It included several nice Waterman fountain pens (a "Laureat", a vintage hard rubber mdoel "94" in the rare blue ripple, and a gorgeous vintage all-sterling-silver model), a Waterford fountain pen, and a fountain pen that doubled as a Holy Water dispenser! Terry left a bit early so I didn't get a chance to photograph his fountain pens. I also meant to photograph Glenn Marcus' newest fountain pen inks, his two bottles of kyo-no-oto ink, but the photographs on his website are infinitely better than anything I could take :) You can find Glenn's review of this ink on this page .

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Don't forget about our September meeting this week! It's on Thursday September 15, 2016 from 6:30pm to 8:30pm (members may arrive a little bit early---at 6:00pm---to chat beforehand) at Perks pen store, 5844 Cambie St, Vancouver, BC (the usual meeting place). The topic will be BLUE FOUNTAIN PENS! No RSVP's required for meetings held at Perks pen store. Hope to see you there!

September meeting info!

Date: Thursday September 15, 2016
Time: 6:30pm to 8:30pm (members may arrive a little bit early---at 6:00pm---to chat beforehand)
Place: Perks pen store, 5844 Cambie St, Vancouver, BC (the usual meeting place)
Topic: BLUE FOUNTAIN PENS!

Believe it or not, we've never done this topic before (we've had Colourful Pens, Autumn Pens, Green Pens-twice!-and Orange Pens, but never Blue Pens) so many thanks to Jerred for suggesting it!

Our secondary topic is always Newest Acquisitions, so if you've received any new pen-related items, please bring them for us to see.

Vancouver Pen Club Summer Dinner 2016!

Many thanks to those 19 VPC members that attended our annual VPC Summer Dinner on July 21st at the Oakridge White Spot restaurant. Unlike a traditional VPC meeting, this casual dinner is just our small way of thanking Richard for his generous and ongoing support for our pen club by hosting our meetings at his great pen store on Cambie Street since November 2007.

There is no theme for these Summer Dinners, but if members have new pens to show, I always ask them to bring them along. The pen on the left is a new acquisition of mine, a Campo Marzio "Celluloid" model fountain pen (although the material is actually resin/acrylic ;) in a lively blue and yellow pattern. Next to it is another CM model, the Ambassador, a nice larger fountain pen in a tortoiseshell-type pattern

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White Spot has always been good at accommodating the size of our parties, and for allowing us to book their indoor "patio" for our annual dinner. A view from one end of the table:

...and a view from the other end:

Richard and myself with Barry looking in:

Many thanks to longtime VPC member Ralph for taking the next set of photos! Here's a shot of VPC newcomers June and Bart:

Clockwise: June, Bart, Jerred, Charles, Bruce and Marey.

That's me (Maja) talking to Charles:

VPC member and camera aficionado Barry K:

A pensive shot of VPCer Tony:

Clockwise from far left: my good friend Brian, Leo, Tony, new member Sophia, Stuart and Norm.

That's longtime VPC member Bruce talking to Marey:

That's me seated next to our Guest of Honour, Richard:

Me giving a little speech, thanking Richard for his generous support for our pen club. Richard has hosting our meetings for almost 9 years at no cost to the VPC, and has been an enthusiastic supporter and gracious host throughout the entire time.

That's Stuart on the far left talking to Norm and Louise (to Louise's left is Alejandra):

Lastly, I couldn't resist taking a selfie with Richard :)

Our next meeting will be held at our usual meeting location--Perks pen store at 5844 Cambie Street in Vancouver, BC on Thursday August 18th at 6:30pm, and the topic/theme will be "Your Favourite Lesser-Known Fountain Pen Brands" (for time reasons, please limit it to 3 brands maximum, and 1-2 examples per brand....ie. max 6 pens total). No RSVP necessary for meetings held at Perks. Hope to see you there!

June meeting photos ~ part two

Continuing with our June theme of "Limited Edition Fountain Pens"...here are some photos of a few of Bruce's amazing Visconti LEs. The one on the far left (in the photo below) is the gorgeous Visconti Mudejar Art LE, made of ivory-coloured resin and covered in scrimshaw engravings, released in 2007 (only 600 made), the one in the middle is the Visconti Istos Aracnis, released in 2012, made of black lucite and covered with a Sterling Silver overlay in a web pattern (only 888 made), and the far right one is a Visconti Ripple LE made for Chatterley Luxury. Excellent info on Visconti's Limited Edition Pens (they made a lot of them!) here on Fountain Pen Hospital's website.

~ Click on photos to enlarge ~

An assortment of wonderful Visconti LE's from their Opera range - from L to R: Opera Master LE, a Wall Street LE (2nd gen), the Aida LE, and the Visconti Opera Club Maple Leaf LE.

Bruce holding a Visconti Verona 'Rebecca Moss' LE:

A quick shot of Stuart's newest acquisition----a green-striped vintage Pelikan 140, a piston-filler made from 1952 to 1965. Those old Pelikan gold nibs usually write really nicely (as an aside, I have a 140 with a fantastic oblique medium nib that I absolutely love using).

Many thanks to Mark S for bringing in his extensive LE collection, which is shown in the three photos below. Mark brought in some Montblanc LEs that he'd shown us two years ago when we did Ltd Edition/Special Edition pens, but he also brought us some other lovely LE pens, including a Visconti Titanic LE (shown on the extreme right of his pen case below):

That's Mark holding the Stipula Casa Mila LE, made to honour visionary architect Antonio Gaudi (there's some interesting information on Stipula's Limited Editions --including the Casa Mila LE-- on this page of FPH's website)

A quick shot of my (Maja's) LEs: From L-R: Delta Vancouver Pen Club LE (#07/25), Waterman Carene David Ogilvy LE (not numbered, but the certificate---which I can't find right now---gives the # made), Retro 51 Double Eight LE (#075/200), Retro 51 Abbondanza, made for Retro 51 by Stipula (#231/351), Stipula Duetto LE made for Seattle's World Lux pen store (#30/50), Stipula Casa Batilo LE (#147/193),the 2007 Bexley Simplicity LE made for FPN--Fountain Pen Network (not numbered but the production run was limited to 115 pieces, iirc). Top left: Pilot M90 LE (limited to 9,000 pieces). Top right: Stipula Passaporto LE made for FPN (#22/200, marked Moderator as I'm an Hon. Admin there)

Lastly, I asked Ben to take a photo of his two modern Sheaffer Balance LEs because I accidentally deleted a quick shot I took of them, and he sent me this great photo showing the Jungle Green LE on the left and the Aspen LE on the right. Both are stunning patterns!

Many thanks to those who brought in LEs I didn't photograph---Julienne (mentioned in part one of this two-part post), Bill K with his Stipula Passaporto FPN LE in blue marble (one of 200 pieces made for the Fountain Pen Network website in 2011) and Jerred for showing us his gorgeous Delta Dolce Vita Oro and Nemosine Singularity fountain pen in Blue Marble (only 500 made in this colour). Natasha brought her OMAS LE pens to the April meeting, so she didn't bring them to the June meeting but you can read about them in our April meeting report :)
And many thanks to those members who brought in their new aquistions (not photographed)----June with her Pelikan 400NN, Bart with his Pelikan M800 in Burnt Orange, Natasha with her Marlen Aleph, Lamy Safari in the Dark Lilac colour for 2016, Lamy 2000 in stainless steel and her Namisu Nova model, which I believe was part of a Kickstarter.com campaign. This is a simple but very elegant design, made from solid aluminum or titanium, which is now (unfortunately) sold out, but if you can get your hands on one, I'm sure you'll be impressed by the design. One of Bethany's two newest acquisitions brought in for us to see was a Tactile Turn 'Gist' fountain pen, another elegently designed pen that was also part of a Kickstarter campain (the other pen she brought was a very cool Franklin Christoph '65'). And last but not least, our generous door prize donor, Jerred brought in his newest pen purchases---a Stipula Etruria Magnifica, a Parker 180 and some Dollar 7171I fountain pens.
It's great when our members have items to bring in for our monthly theme or show us their newest pen-related purchases....but even if you *don't* have something for the theme or new stuff to show, please come to our meetings anyway. The point of our club is to have fun, learn and/or educate people about fountain... and we're not pen snobs, either ;)

June meeting photos ~ part one

We had excellent attendance for our June meeting; 26 members (including one new member, Sophia) showed up at Perks. Many thanks to Jerred for his donation of the door prizes---three Dollar piston-fillers, won by Stuart, Tony and Ralph!

Our theme for the meeting was "Limited Edition Fountain Pens", and we saw many beautiful examples brought in by our members. We actually did this topic back in July of 2014 but we've had so many new members since then, so when one of them asked me if we could do that as a topic, I said 'sure'!

Mido started off the meeting by showing us his Pilot Vanishing Point Limited Edition (LE for short) fountain pen in purple. The pen was released in August 2008, and only 2008 pens were made, 900 being released to the U.S. There is some excellent information on VPs on Carmen Rivera's extensive website devoted to this popular fountain pen model ( link ).

~ Click on photos to enlarge ~

Our secondary topic is always Newest Acquisitions, so Peter brought in his classy new fountain pen blotter (shown below), in addition to his Delta Vancouver Pen Club LE (#12/25).

Here are Julienne's newest acquisitions---a nice assortment of vintage fountain pens shown below. For the evening's primary theme, Julienne brought in her Delta Vancouver Pen Club LE, a Monteverde Fantasia LE, a Delta Capri Marina Grande LE & its counterpart, a Delta Marina Piccola LE (a sort of 'his & hers' set; I didn't photograph them, but there's some good info on them here ), as well as her OMAS 360 LE (#108/360).

This is Christopher's fountain pen that Julienne is trying out here; it's an exceptionally smooth-writing vintage Waterman Taperite that was a recent acquisition for him.

More new acquisitions! This is Ben's beautiful Sheaffer Legacy Sterling Silver fountain pen. The fountain pen is nicely balanced, and the metal has a very pleasant warmth to it due to the heat conductivity of the silver. Great buy, Ben!

One more new acquisition photo before we continue on with the Limited Edition theme---this is Aaron's fantastic new Montblanc Heritage Collection 1912 fountain pen. It's a very classy-looking modern pen that evokes Montblanc's early days in terms of looks *and* design---it has a very cool retractable nib mechanism, in addition to a piston-filling mechanism!

VPC Summer Dinner ~ information for members

The annual summer dinner for VPC members will be held on Thursday July 21.
VPC members - please RSVP me no later than July 18 as per the instructions in the members' group emails I sent on July 5th and 9th.

Please note: this is not a regular meeting, and there will be no regular meeting in July, just the dinner.
We will return to our regular "themed" meetings at Perks on Thursday August 18 (theme: to be announced). Have a great summer, everyone! :)

May meeting photos

We had good attendance for the May 17th meeting held at our usual venue, Perks pen store at 5844 Cambie Street, Vancouver. Sixteen members, including three newcomers (Bart, Jas and June), showed up to see and discuss our May topic, fountain pens with extra-fine (XF) nibs. We saw a wide variety of pens, both modern and vintage, and I snapped some quick photos of them (VPC group photos by Richard).

Here is what our members brought for the topic:
Alejanda: Parker '51'
Bart: Lamy 2000 & Pilot Metropolitan.
Catherine: (didn't bring it, but has a Lamy Safari with an XF nib)
Charles: Sheaffer Snorkel, Sheaffer Balance, Sheaffer Craftsman, Sheaffer Admiral and two Parker '51's.
Christopher: Parker Moderne, Esterbrook Dollar Pen in the hard-to-find "Cracked Ice" pattern, Peter Pan, Esterbrook Skyline & Parker Victory.
Jerred: Pilot FK-700R, Lanbitou 'Missile', Reform 1745, Kaweco Sport, Delta Passion.
June: Lamy Accent.
Maja: Esterbook desk pen, Esterbrook SJ w/9128 (XF flexible) nib, Pilot Custom 74, Cross Radiance, Online Vision, Lamy Safari w/custom barrel by Penchetta Pens & Knives, Sailor Procolor 500 in the Hoshizuku (Stardust) pattern.
Mark: Parker Slip Cap Eyedropper filler with middle joint (ca. 1903)
Mido: Montblanc Generations, modern Parker Duofold.
Mindy: Esterbrook J with #1550 nib, Pilot Penmanship, Sailor Pikachu Special Edition, Pilot Falcon.
Stuart: Sheaffer flat-top ringtop, Sheaffer Balance with Military Clip, Waterman CF, Eversharp Skyline, Parker '21' Deluxe & several Sheaffer Snorkels.

And now, without further ado, here are the pics (click on photos to enlarge)...

(From Left to Right: Some of Maja's XF-nibbed pens: Esterbook desk pen, black Pilot Custom 74, black Cross Radiance, red Online Vision & red Esterbrook SJ)

(L-R: Lamy 2000, Eversharp Skyline, Sailor Procolor 500 in the Hoshizuku (Stardust) pattern, Sheaffer PFM, and a red & black marbled Lamy Safari with custom barrel made by Penchetta Pen & Knife. In the background is Jas' newest acquisition, a wonderful Parker Duofold "Big Red" fountain pen)

Our secondary topic is always Newest Acquisitions, and in the photo above, you can see Graham's red Pilot FK-700R & blue Pilot Decimo, Maja's new orangey Stipula Duetto (in the Cognac colour) & a black MB 146 clone with rose gold trim that she found on AliExpress.com, and June's new Noodler's Neponset in the "John Mung" acrylic pattern (white with red swirls). June recently acquired a gorgeous Pelikan M600 in the pink-striped barrel pattern and Bart brought his cool new Visconti Homo Sapiens Bronze Age (both not pictured).

(Maja's newest acquisitions: (in foreground) stainless steel Waterman Hemisphere fountain pen, grey Parker Touché felt-tip pen, green-marbled Wearever fountain pen, and PaperMate's first ballpoint model)

Just above the ink bottle cap, you can see Mindy's clear Pilot Penmanship fountain pen. She actually came up with the idea for our May topic, so many thanks again, Mindy!

The fountain pens that Jerred brought for our topic (along with a new Parker Sonnet) can be seen laid out on the cloth pen case with blue trim above, and somewhere in the photo there should be a new acquisition of Bob W's - a Sheaffer '100' he won in a draw at the Vancouver Pen Shop.

Group photo! From L-R: Christopher, Charles, Maja, Catherine, Alejandra, Mindy, Jerred, Stuart, Jas, June, Bart, Bob W, Graham. Present at meeting but not pictured: Richard, Mark and Mido.

Jerred's black Pilot FCM-500R and Graham's version of the same pen model in red. This is the gold-nibbed fountain pen that costs less than $65 CAD, available from Amazon.ca . Amazing price and a really nice writer. Thanks for the heads-up about this great deal, Jerred!

Mido's modern Parker Duofold and a Montblanc Generations in the harder-to-find purple colour.

Christopher's Peter Pan fountain pen made by Salz. It's difficult to see the scale, but it's a very tiny fountain pen. There's some info on this model on Richard Binder's helpful site here.

Stuart's newest acquisition, the Lamy Safari 2016 Special Edition in Dark Lilac. It's a lovely matte purple material which looks even better in person!

These are the XF-nibbed fountain pens Stuart brought in for our May topic, along with his new Safari.

I'm trying to remember if any of Stuart's other pens here have XF nibs or not...Apologies, Stuart!....I do recall that the nice burgundy Sheaffer Connaisseur (2nd from the left) was a fairly new acquisition for him. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Our next meeting will be held on Thursday June 16 at the Perks pen store at 5844 Cambie Street, in Vancouver(our usual venue) from 6:30pm-8:30pm and will feature Limited Edition fountain pens as our June topic/theme, so if you have any to show, please bring them with you. As always, Newest Acquisitions is our secondary topic. No need to RSVP for any meeting at Perks. Hope to see you there!
Cheers ~ Maja