Like writing with a fountain pen? Use quality paper

Nothing can beat the thrill of writing with a fountain pen. It feels special to write with one and the best handwriting comes out when a fountain pen is used.

While writing with a fountain pen is pure bliss, using bad quality paper takes the fun out of it. And the nib could get damaged too. A serious fountain pen collector and enthusiast knows this.

Looking around on the internet and writing instrument forums, one will come across names like Moleskine, Rhodia, Clairefontaine, Tomoe River and others. Enter the world of high-quality notebooks and journals. There is no point in buying an excellent Sailor or Parker fountain pen and using it on photocopy paper. If this is done, the tines of the nib will dig into the paper and pick up the wood fibres. This will not only give a bad writing experience but could spoil the nib too. This is because photocopy paper is for, well, photocopying or writing on with a ball point pen at best.

Notebooks and journals from the mentioned brands are not cheap. A small B5 size (roughly palm-sized) notebook will cost nothing less than Rs 500. The price will obviously increase if it is hard-bound, has a greater number of pages or is bigger in size.

The reason they are expensive is the quality of paper. The paper in these notebooks is smooth and helps the nib glide effortlessly. And with the paper being of good quality, the nib will not pick up fibres from the paper. Thus, the nib is also not prone to clogging and damage.

Some of these high-quality notebooks have archival quality paper. For instance, if one is writing down an old family recipe, would we want the writing to fade away after a few years? Obviously not. This is where archival quality paper comes of use.

There is more to paper than being smooth to write on and having archival qualities – bleed and feathering. These will happen with cheap quality paper.

Bleed is when the paper soaks the ink so much that the writing is visible on the reverse side of the sheet. When this happens, one will not be able to write on the reverse because there a lot of ink already. Fresh writing on the reverse side will not be clearly visible.

Feathering is when what is written is not sharp. The paper fibres will begin to absorb the ink and the words written will have a bloated look. Again, not desirable.

The answer to avoiding these problems is to use good quality paper. Using good paper or notebooks will not only leave behind neat writing, it will also prevent the fountain pen from getting damaged.