August meeting at the Vancouver Pen Shop! (new date & time!)

What: Vancouver Pen Club August 2024 monthly meeting

When: Thursday August 22 from 6:00pm to 8:00pm (*please note*: this is not our typical third-Thursday-of-the-month meeting date)

Where: The Vancouver Pen Shop, 555 Howe Street in downtown Vancouver, BC.

Theme: "Pencils--any kind!" (theme suggested by Shannon, the Pen Shop's manager)

Believe it or not, we've never done this theme before! Many vintage fountain pens came as sets with mechanical pencils, though, so we've seen a lot of pencils over the past 17+ years at our meetings. The pencils don't have to be vintage--they can be vintage, modern, mechanical, wooden, novelty ... whatever!

There's not going to be any formal show & tell at this meeting as it's basically just a get-together, so don't worry if you don't have any pencils to show other attendees/Pen Shop staff. If you have new acquisitions you want to show others, please feel free to bring them with you. The store will be open for your shopping convenience during the meeting! 😊

Our thanks to the Vancouver Pen Shop for offering to be our August meeting hosts! Hope to see you at their great pen store that evening!
Any questions? Please email us at vancouverpenclub@gmail.com

Photos from our July meeting!

Our July meeting was held at the Vancouver Public Library's Terry Salman branch on Thursday July 18th. There were 22 members in attendance that night, including one brand-new member (Esther) and two visitors from India and Japan (Abhijit and CY)!

(all photos by Maja, except where needed ~ please click on images to enlarge)

L-R (standing): Stuart, Abhijit, Asifa, David C, James, Rene, Glenn M, Shona. myself (Maja); L-R (seated): Jerred, MMina, Esther, Grant, Christopher, Phil, Paul, Rumi and Vladan. Not pictured: Dana, CY, Yugo. Many thanks to Liz for taking the photos!

Our meeting topic was "Birthday Pens" and we saw some very nice examples. The topic was inspired by the recent birthday of our youngest pen club member, who turned 10 years old last month😊

I didn't get a photo of her birthday pen, but newcomer Esther showed us a Caran d'Ache 849 ballpoint that she got for her birthday (love those ballpoints!). Esther told us that her first fountain pen was a Lamy 'Safari', but that she subsequently bought others, including a Platinum 'Preppy' and a MUJI fountain pen. Her most recent purchase was a Sailor dip pen.

Stuart brought this handsome Montblanc '146' fountain for our primary meeting topic; he later told me that it was given to him on his 21st birthday. Stuart has brought this fountain pen to our meetings a few times (for various topics) and it's obvious how much he cherishes it :)

Our secondary topic is always "Newest Acquisitions" so Stuart showed us his new vintage black Parker '51' with Lustraloy cap. The shiny golden Sheaffer 'Imperial Triumph' Touchdown fountain pen was given to Stuart's maternal Grandfather on his 65th birthday, in 1963.  His Grandmother purchased it at Woodward’s Oakridge, and paid $35 for it, a high price at the time!

A couple of Asifa's recent purchases--a TWSBI 'Eco' Indigo Bronze (filled with Robert Oster's wonderful "Blue Denim" ink) and a purple Pilot 'Metropolitan' with a Pilot "Calligraphy Medium" (marked "CM") stub/italic steel nib on it. I can't remember what ink was in the 'Metro', but I know that Asifa likes to match inks with pens of the same/similar colour :)

Vladan's handsome green-striped Pelikan M800 was a recent acquisition....

...as was his new Retro 51 'Tornado' 'Tesla' fountain pen. This model was a tribute to the famous Serbian engineer/inventor and the pattern was inspired by Tesla's spiral coil, used in his wireless power experiments. Vladan also showed us his new Pilot Custom '912' (not pictured).

David (who’s a really big vintage Parker fan) used a birthday gift card to the Vancouver Pen Shop to purchase this Platinum '3776 Century' fountain pen (you can't go wrong with a modern classic like this pen!)

...and speaking of David's love of old Parkers---he recently bought the "Blue Pearl" striped Parker 'Vacumatic' above. The top pen in the photo is another classic vintage Parker fountain pen--a Parker 'Duofold' in "Chinese Red" belonging to Grant... and it's the first fountain pen he restored himself (yay, Grant!).

The middle fountain pen is an Ingersoll 'Mickey Mouse' fountain pen with images of the iconic cartoon character on the cap band. It belongs to Christopher, who said he bought it for himself many years after spotting it for the first time at a department store. I didn't get a chance to photograph it, but Christopher also brought in a tiny Peter Pan fountain pen with a 14K gold overlay.

Christopher is a huge fan of vintage pens, but this beautiful OMAS 'Gentleman' (above) was a recent modern acquisition.

Above: Liz's impressive Namiki 'Emperor', one of pendom's largest fountain pen models…

Another eye-catching pen belonging to Liz--a Schon dsgn fountain pen in Ultem material. The pen sports a very cool Schon-designed Monoc nib. The entire nib and collar are made from a single block of Grade 5 Titanium, and there is no tipping material added to the end of the nib.

I'm sorry I didn't photograph Liz's Opus 88 and the Turnt Pen Co. fountain pen she got/bought for her birthday (I think it was a 'Bardugo 13' model in "Ocarina Abalone"), but she brought them--and other two pens-- all inked up for us to try, along with this note showing what ink was in each pen (thanks, Liz!).

Above: My haul from the recent Pacific Northwest Pen Show, held in Portland, Oregon (I did a report on the pen show & the stuff I got in the blog post before this one)

(Left to right: Nahvalur 'Voyage' Pride 2024 special edition, Zodiac Pen Co. 'Taurus' in "Polar Cenote", Newton Pens 'Moody' (Medium size) in "Ivory Roses", Mike's Pen Fun handmade fountain pen in "Full Tilt Boogie" resin, Karas Pen Co. 'Vertex' Baltimore Pen Show special edition and Waterman Harley- Davidson 'Combusition'. Top: Retro 51 Tornado rollerball "Good Dog Sheldon" special edition made for Dromgoole's pen store. The Zodiac Pen Co. 'Taurus' pen was a belated self-gift for my May birthday. The cool Rickshaw Bagworks six-pen roll features a design by our pen club's own Richardo!

I saw Shona & James at the Portland pen show and at the meeting, Shona told us about the things she bought there--a special nib by The Good Blue (and another by JoWo) and a handmade fountain pen from Mondu Pens (mondupens.com). James showed a lot of restraint (lol) and didn't buy anything at the show.

The most recent acquisition of mine -- a vintage Sheaffer 'Reminder' ballpoint with perpetual calendar, a gift I got from my fellow VPCer Paul just before our meeting.

It's called a 'Reminder' model because you can't clip the pen onto a shirt pocket (and possibly staining the fabric) unless the pen tip is withdrawn by pressing on the clip. Sheaffer came out with a modern version of the 'Reminder' a few years ago, but I prefer the old-style. All my vintage version needed was a modern Sheaffer ballpoint refill (which I had at home) to get it up and running again :) Thanks again, Paul!

It wouldn't be a Vancouver Pen Club meeting if Jerred didn't show us another addition to his wonderful Delta fountain pen collection, and this meeting was no exception. The bright orange model in the middle is a Delta 'Dolce Vita Oro' (mid-size), flanked by his Montblanc '149' and Jerred's new A.G. Spalding pocket fountain pen.

Paul recently acquired some vintage fountain pens, including a Sheaffer 'Fineline' model (top pen) and the vintage Esterbrook 'M2' model below it.



Above: Another vintage Sheaffer that Paul recently acquired...

That's Abhijit trying out the elegant Montblanc 'Noblesse' fountain pen Paul bought for himself as a "self-gift". Abhijit came all the way from Calcutta, India to attend our meeting, and it was a pleasure chatting with him about pens and the pen community in his city/region.

This is Paul holding his newest acquisition---an oversized store "dummy" fountain pen (advertising pen) that he won in our July meeting's door prize draw! (congratulations to Paul and thanks to Christopher for donating the prize). Paul had made some dip pen ink from black walnut and brought samples to give out to our members, so his door prize win was rather karmic lol

Rumi brought some lovely new acquisitions to show us (top to bottom): a beautiful handmade resin fountain pen made by Springfield Crafts (by Anson, who is one of our club's members), a purple Pilot 'Decimo' and a Leonardo 'Momento Zero' "Hawaii". The 3-pen case at the top (a Rickshaw Bagworks 3-Pen "Coozy" case) was a limited edition, specially made for the Canadian Fountain Pen Enthusiasts (CFPE), a Facebook Group Rumi belongs to.

Phil showed us some newest acquisitions, including two pens he bought in Trondheim, Norway (!)  -- a bright blue Pilot 'Explorer' (Phil said this one takes international cartridges, which is unusual--turns out that versions of this model sold in the EU are like this) and a Lamy 'Safari' Strawberry. I believe the beautiful fountain pen at the bottom is Mmina's Sailor Shikiori (in the "Dragon Palace" colour, I think...).

Another fountain pen Phil recently acquired --this one from a pen shop in Greece!--- a gorgeous new-style OMAS 'Bolonga' in the "Grigio Luminoso" material. The pen is made of Diamondcast resin, and the cap band features the city of Bologna's famous porticoes.

I forgot to photograph another handsome Italian fountain pen that we saw at the meeting--Glenn's amazing Scribo 'Feel' Mosto fountain pen. The pen was a "birthday pen" and was featured on Glenn's excellent website here: https://www.glennspens.com/pensofnote/Scribo-Feel-Mosto.html

Dana came to our meeting with lots of wonderful modern fountain pens, including these soft pastel-coloured Sailor 'Realo' fountain pens that had Zoom/Music nibs on them...

...as well as this elegant vintage Sheafer 'Targa'  with a factory italic/stub nib on it (I tried it and it's a wonderful writer :)

Above: One of Rene's recent acquisitions--a Platinum '3776 Century' "Sands of Komodo" fountain pen. The rose gold trim was inspired by the pink sand beaches (and  the pen’s colour by the tropical waters) surrounding Indonesia's Komodo Island.

And here are some birthday fountain pens Rene showed us--a Cross 'Townsend' "Year of the Rat" Special Edition (in the box) -- every year, Cross comes out with a new pen based on the year of the Chinese Zodiac (hopefully they'll have a Year of the Snake for my birth year!)---as well as a brushed stainless steel Lamy 'Studio' and a handsome Mabie-Todd 'Swan' fountain pen from the 1930s.

Above: More of Rene's recent acquisitions ... but they're playing peek-a-boo (I ran out of time to take them out--it was a really busy meeting). Among other new acquisitions, Rene showed us two pens he got in Switzerland--a Parker 'Vector' "Le Petit Prince" fountain pen and a Waterman 'Laureat' (not pictured).

And last, but not least--two lovely pen cases belonging to Rene that were made by Rickshaw Bagworks specially for the Canadian Fountain Pen Enthusiasts (CFPE) Facebook Group. These are the most recent Rickshaw cases made for the CFPE; Rumi's Rickshaw case (the bright green/yellow Northern Lights case further up this blog post) came out last year.

Many thanks to everyone who came to our July meeting, whether you brought anything for the topics or not! Information about our August meeting will be posted on our website (please check the top of each website for that info in big red letters) as soon as the date/time/venue are finalized!

(~blog post by Maja~)

2024 Pacific Northwest Pen Show report/my pen show haul!

I had a great time at the 2nd annual Pacific Northwest Pen Show last weekend (July 13-14, 2024) and thought I'd share a few photos and thoughts about the show...

I didn’t attend the VIP event on Friday, but I know the cost included discounts to a lot of show vendors, so it’s something I’d seriously consider in the future. There was a pen club breakfast at the show hotel on Sunday (which was free, if you brought your own food), but I’m not an early bird, so I skipped it. Aside from that, I was at the show all day Saturday and most of Sunday (good to see nearly all of the vendors staying until the very end of the show). There were door prizes given away, but I didn't win anything. I did, however, come home with a lot of neat stuff (as you'll see ;)

(all photos in this blog post by Maja ~ please click on images to enlarge )

The 2024 show was held in a new location--the Monarch Hotel & Conference Center in Clackamas, Oregon, a suburb southeast of Portland. There was lots of good signage and helpful volunteers to guide us to the pen show floor on the lower level. Members of PDX Pen (pen club in Portland) were on hand to greet us there, confirm our registration (I prepaid for my 2-day ticket online) and give us our show lanyards. There were more volunteers ---well-identified by their blue pen show t-shirts---walking around the show floor helping attendees and vendors throughout the show. There were also security guards present, but they were completely unobtrusive.

And now, here's the show floor! 

 

 

The top two photos were taken on one side of the floor...

 

...and the two photos directly above were taken on the other side of the room. The vendor tables were spaced a comfortable distance apart, so that attendees could stand on each end of a table to browse, if the front of a table was occupied; I found this very helpful.

The first vendor I sought out was actually Pen Realm (so I could sign up for a nib grinding session with nibmeister Kirk Speer), but then I raced over to Dromgoole's (above--they had a huge display, so you couldn't miss them) to buy some special limited edition pen show items before they sold out...

..and here they are---a limited edition "Solo pen sleeve" & "Musette bag", made by Rickshaw Bagworks for the 2024 Pacific Northwest Pen Show! 😀

The design was inspired by Portland’s city flag, and there was also a zippered "Sinclair" Rickshaw case that came in the same design. I'd just bought one of the cases a few months ago --with a SugarTurtle Studios design-- so I passed on that one. I had the pleasure of talking to Rickshaw’s founder (Mark Dwight) the following day and thanked him for creating these great commemorative items. Dromgoole's was also selling a store exclusive Retro 51 'Tornado' rollerball special edition called "Good Boy Sheldon”, a tribute to Dromgoole' bulldog mascot 🐶-- so I bought that (lower right corner of the photo above) as well.

Next stop was Oblation Papers (who have a brick & mortar store in downtown Portland) to look for a pen I’d spotted on their website before the show—a  Vertex” fountain pen in a confetti pattern by the Karas Pen Company (upper left corner of photo above). I’m a huge fan of Karas’ pens and an even bigger fan of their 'Vertex' fountain pens, so I knew I had to buy it at the show because I’d never seen it for sale anywhere else (according to its packaging, it's a Baltimore Pen Show special limited edition!)


Above: Zodiac Pen Company 'Taurus' model in (Bob Dupras') Corrl Creations' "Polar Cenote" handpoured resin (Isn't it beautiful??)

I'd contacted Bart Conner of the Zodiac Pen Company (the maker of these beautiful handmade fountain pens) just prior to the show about a particular model in a particular material that I'd seen on his website. All of the models on Bart's website are named after Zodiac signs and Taurus is my sign, so I wanted to buy a special fountain pen to (belatedly) commemorate my birthday. I didn't feel comfortable asking Bart to hold that particular pen for me, but he kindly offered to do so and bring it to the show.

I played a wee trick on Bart when I first saw him at the show. The pen in question wasn't among the ones Bart was selling at the show (because he said he'd put it on hold for me), but I fake-innocently asked him: "Excuse me, do you have a Taurus in Polar Cenote for sale?". We hadn't met in person before, so Bart didn't recognize me, but then he looked at my name tag and slowly started to smile, saying I'd fooled him. Anyway, sure enough --- Bart remembered to bring the pen with him to the show...and when I saw it, I immediately bought it from him :) My photos don't do it justice--there are so many shades of blue in the material--but it's gorgeous (and very well-made).

(Photo of Bart and myself, taken by his helper --and huge Zodiac Pen Co. fan-- Lexi)

I then headed over to Pen Realm's large vendor display to buy another fountain pen I'd made inquiries about, prior to the show. The pen in question was made of a DiamondCast®️ resin (which made each pen unique-looking), so I'd asked Kirk Speer of Pen Realm if he was planning to bring more than one example to the pen show. He said he'd bring several of them, so I was very pleased to hear that. I asked Kirk's wife Crystal about the pens at the show and, yes--they'd brought multiples with them, yay! Each pen was different than the rest (as I expected), but I wound up choosing this beautiful example below:

My new Nahvalur 'Voyage' Pride 2024 special edition fountain pen!

I love colourful pens and this one is amazing. Crystal said it had a Broad nib on it, but it wasn't marked as such, so I was a bit confused. Turns out that Nahvalur put "F" and "M" engravings on the Fine and Medium nibs, but left the Broad nibs unmarked. The boxes for the pens were left in Colorado (too bulky to carry!), but Crystal said they'd ship it to me right after the show at no charge. I've always had great customer service from Pen Realm and this show was no exception. I had signed up for a 3:30 pm nib-grinding appointment with Kirk and decided to get the Nahvalur's Broad nib reground to a cursive italic or stub.

I asked Kirk for a quick selfie after he reground my Nahvalur nib (to a great cursive italic Broad), and he kindly obliged (he held my phone --I'm terrible at taking selfies). There was a selfie station at the show, but I couldn't get a good solo photo with it lol. Still, it was a nice little detail, one of many at this well-organized pen show.

He was busy earlier, so I didn't get a chance to (finally!) meet the one & only Shawn Newton (above) of Newton Pens until later on Saturday! (do you like my t-shirt?? LOL)

I’d known Shawn for many years (we were both Admins on the Fountain Pen Network-aka FPN) and I’d seen many of his YouTube videos over the years, but had never met him in person. Well, I can tell you that he’s just as nice a guy as I expected 😁 and I spent a fair amount of time chatting with him on both Saturday and Sunday. Don’t get me wrong—Shawn had a steady stream of customers, but he made time for everyone and was incredibly welcoming to anyone who came by his table to see the beautiful pens he had for sale.

Earlier on Saturday, I'd bought a specially-engraved JoWo nib --a limited edition nib engraved by Kirk Speer of Pen Realm for the 2024 Pacific Northwest Pen Show (in the photo above)-- and subsequently put it in a lovely fountain pen I bought from Shawn (there's a photo of the entire pen in the second-to-last photo of this blog post). The nib engraving, incidentally, is that of the design on the carpeting used at PDX— Portland’s International Airport—which gained a cult-like following.

I needed a little break after all that pen show excitement, so I had a delicious Buenos Aires sandwich ("Shaved cold cut roast beef, chimichurri horseradish, shaved white onion, arugula, tomato, warm baguette and au jus") at the hotel's restaurant, de Fuego Grille. Boy, was it ever tasty...and the service at the restaurant was really good, too.

Back to the pen show now!

(Ahhhh, the pool right by the pen show floor...)

It was really hot in Portland that weekend, so the pool looked especially inviting, but I had a 1:30pm class on "Experiments with Handwriting" to go to! (a class on handwriting + true crime----how could I pass it up? lol) It was a well-attended, interesting (free) class with Jacqueline Joseph, one of the top forensic handwriting examiners in the United States. Next time, I'll sign up for more classes---I wanted to maximize my "floor time" this year :)

Above: Pen accessories from Ink-a-Pet!

I think the whole family was on hand at the pen show, but I had a nice time chatting with Ink-a-Pet's head honcho, 10-year Calvin (who patiently explained all the cool pen-related references in the company's brand-new colouring book --seen in the last photo of this blog post).

The other Ink-a-Pet products I bought were all 3-D printed (they had a printer going during the show—how cool is that??) -- very cute designs, very well-made and highly functional as ink vial holders or single-pen holders. If you want, you can buy accessories for them, such as the removable blanket I bought for the Sleeping Cat, a palm tree I got for one of the dogs (“Ink’s Best Friend”), or swim gear (goggles & floatie) for the Little Penguin. There’s also pirate-themed gear, sun hats and umbrellas for these items as well as the Inktopus vial holder and Sleeping Cat/Dog pen rests (which I didn't get) for sale on their website.

The unusual fountain pen above was purchased second-hand from Michael Auyeung of GLAMPIG (Greater Los Angeles Metro Pen & Ink Club) and it was a collaboration between the Waterman pen company and Harley-Davidson. The model was called the Waterman Harley-Davidson 'Combustion' and it was inspired by the 1936 Harley-Davidson EL36 motorcycle. It’s a striking-looking fountain pen and at first glance, I thought "it wasn’t my thing", but I appreciate unique designs in pens, so I bought it from Mike. He and I had a nice chat on Sunday about fountain pens, the pen community and the various pen boards we belonged to over the years.

The adorable “Pen Mule” keychain (designed by Angela He of inkyconverters on Etsy) next to the Waterman was purchased from Entropy Ink (Nikola Pang), who had an amazing selection of vintage pens at the show (below):

He was really busy, but nibmeister CY of Tokyo Station Pens (above) and I had a short chat about the special nib-grinding event at Buchan's Stationery that CY was doing this weekend in Vancouver (more info at this link: https://www.buchanst.com/blogs/blog/sign-up-for-our-exclusive-nib-grinding-event-with-cy-from-tokyo-station-pens) (Note: I did get a nib reground by CY after the Portland show--ie. during the event in Vancouver ---my Pelikan M600's 14K gold Medium nib was reground to lovely Stub)

The last fountain pen I bought at the pen show was this stunning handmade pen from Mike Green of Mike's Pen Fun. It was made from a resin blank called "Full Tilt Boogie", handpoured by The Pensmiths. It's such a well-made pen, and beautifully polished to a mirror finish. Mike has a really wide selection of nibs to go with the fountain pens he makes and sells, but I knew I had to get a colourful nib for this multi-coloured beauty, so I chose a rainbow JoWo Broad nib for it.

Mike’s nibs are all expertly pre-tuned by Kirk (Pen Realm) Speer, and this one is a wonderful writer. Oh, and the pen came with a handmade cotton towel pen sleeve made by Mike's wife Theresa (you can see the pale yellow sleeve in the last photo of this blog post)

Above: Mike and his lovely wife Theresa (they drove all the way from Minnesota for the show!). I spent a lot of time chatting with them because (a) they were so friendly and (b) because I couldn't decide which of Mike's fountain pens to buy! They had a great selection of handmade fountain pens made of different materials (resin, ebonite, Micarta), and it was really tough to choose just one.

I first heard of Mike's fountain pens while watching pen review videos by Larry Berrones of "Larry's Fountain Pens" on YouTube. Larry is always raving about the great handmade fountain pen made by a guy named Mike Green, so when I heard that Mike was coming to Portland for this year's pen show, I had to check out what he was selling. Good thing I did because I love the pen I bought from him! (thank you, Larry!)

Above: All three handmade fountain pens I bought at the show (pocket notebooks made by Curnow Bookbinding and Leatherwork) -left to right: Mike's Pen Fun (Mike Green), Newton Pens (Shawn Newton), Zodiac Pen Company (Bart Conner)

The lovely fountain pen in the middle that I'd mentioned earlier (the one with the JoWo 2024 Pacific Northwest Pen Show nib on it) is an exquisite Newton Pens “Moody” model (in the Medium size) in a gorgeous material called “Ivory Roses”, a handpoured resin made by Jonathon Brooks of The Carolina Pen Company. Shawn Newton has been making fantastic handmade pens since 2012, and this one is no exception.

The pen came with a beautiful multicoloured single-pen sleeve handmade by Shawn's wife Elizabeth. The pen sleeve is in the photo below (to the left of the pen) and it's an elegant design that protects the writing instrument inside, and also prevents it from falling out without the use of a flap. Shawn usually includes one of Elizabeth's pen sleeves when you purchase a pen from him -- a nice touch!

Above: My complete haul from the 2024 Pacific Northwest Pen Show, including the official pen show t-shirt I bought on Sunday :)

Many thanks again to show producer Staci Paley, all the vendors and speakers, and all the volunteers! I had a wonderful time at the show and hope to be back for the next one!

 ~Blog post by Maja~

(*photos from yesterday's monthly meeting of our pen club will be posted early next week!)