(Kimberly (she/her) took the express train down the fountain pen/stationery rabbit hole and doesn't want to be rescued. She can be found on Instagram @allthehobbies because there really are many, many hobbies!.)
Last year, Chartpak, distributor of many art supply brands including Kuretake, Higgins, Koh-i-Noor, and more, added some new brands to their portfolio including Fabriano and Maruman. So when Gary Lange from Chartpak asked me if I would be willing to check out the Fabriano line of notebooks, of course, I said yes (after a green light from the Bossman)!.
The Fabriano Ecoqua Original Notebook that I am reviewing is the A5 staplebound version with 40 sheets/ 80 pages, and a thicker paper cover. It also comes in A4 and pocket sized staplebound, as well as spiral bound. The paper is 90gsm Bioprima paper which is a naturally white paper (no bleaches or whiteners were used). It is also acid-free and “long life certified (ISO 9706)” so it should not yellow with time. According to Fabriano (which you will also find on the last page of the notebook), Bioprima is made in their hydro-powered paper mills, so no fossil fuel consumption, which is pretty cool.
Some of the colors of the Fabriano Ecoqua Original Notebooks. The 290 gsm Sirio Denim paper cover has a nice linen-like texture to it.
The back of the notebook has the notebook details printed on the white section (it is not a label or sticker). The Ecoqua comes in Squared (5mm grid), Dots (4mm), Blank, and Lines (8mm).
I decided to test out the Lines version since I don’t use lined paper very often.
Given that this is an Italian notebook, I had to test it by copying an Italian book, right? This is Un amico per Dragone (A friend for Dragon). Yes, this book is for 5+ year olds, and yes, it’s the same Dav Pilkey of Captain Underpants, aka Capitan Mutanda (in Italian)!
Pens/inks used are from top to bottom: TWSBI Eco, 1.1, Scribo Rosso Chianti (not pictured), Schon Dsgn Pocket 6, Masuyama Needlepoint, Ferris Wheel Press Pumpkin Patch; Kaweco Sport, BB Dentist (architect) by Meltem, Colorverse Schrodinger; Schon Dsgn Full Size, Cursive Monoc, Montblanc UNICEF Blue.
The paper was smooth with the subtlest hint of tooth, similar to Clairefontaine but not quite as glossy feeling. The needlepoint didn’t feel the texture and wrote with no problems, ditto with the Kaweco architect and Schon Cursive Monoc.
Minimal ghosting on the back but…
You can see a wee bit of bleedthrough where the wettest part of the TWSBI 1.1 laid the most ink. It’s not very noticeable but it’s there.
Platinum 3776 Medium, Kuretake Zsolnay Green; Platinum Plaisir, Platinum Pink (cartridge); Leonardo Momento Zero, Fine, Pennonia x Scriptus Niagara Peach (which is looking yellower in the picture than the more peachy color it is in real life).
No problems with the above pens/inks either. The nibs glided on the page without feeling like they’re sliding out of control, which is sometimes a complaint of Clairefontaine (I personally don’t have a problem with Clairefontaine’s smoothness/coated feeling).
I picked a few flexy/bouncy nibs to see how it would handle the nib “scritches” as well as the areas where the nibs deposited more ink.
Left to right: BlueDew flex, Robert Oster Blue Water Ice; Aurora Optima 997 Fine Flex, Robert Oster Cosmic Swirl; Pilot Custom 912 Medium (forgot to swap in the FA nib, oops), Callifolio Grenat; Pilot Falcon Soft Fine, Pelikan Violet.
It feathered for the first few letters of the purple “Dragone”, but otherwise the paper handled the flex nibs just fine.
The BlueDew has a traditional dip nib-style of nib, in that it is very scritchy when writing (this is normal), but it scritched its way across the paper without any issues and I was still able to get a lot of line variation.
Left to right: TWSBI Eco, Fine, Akkerman GourmetPens Pink; Penlux Delgado, Broad, Vanness Hootenanny; Sailor Pro Gear Slim, MF, Sailor Rikyu-cha.
After the first chapter, I decided to see if printing felt any different than cursive.
I was able to get nice fine lines from the Sailor PGS MF (which felt a bit finer than my usual MFs), and I liked the shading from the Hootenanny (which is slightly lighter and a bit more magenta-y in real life, but I didn’t want to alter the color of the paper with too much editing).
Flip the page back to page 3 and you can barely see the ghosting. There was just a wee bit of bleedthrough under “chiamò” from a spot where ink pooled on the other side.
And no paper review would be complete without some non-fountain pens, so I used my default set of non-FPs on the next page.
Standard pens (l to r): Uni-ball Signo DX, 0.38, Pilot G-2 07, Frixion Clicker 07, Lamy Tipo Medium, Parker Jotter, Ballpoint, Parker Flighter, Gel, Spoke Clickstream, Schmidt EasyFlow 9000 M, Zebra Sarasa Clip 05, Ticonderoga 2HB Soft, Sakura Pigma Micron 05, Tombow ABT, color 476, Sharpie.
In the pic below, I accidentally switched the Lamy Tipo and Parker Jotter (not Flighter), so the 4th pen (aka 5th line) is the Lamy Tipo and the 5th pen is the Parker Jotter.
Top to about halfway are the above pens except the Sharpie. After the Tombow marker, I started from the top of the lineup with the Uni-ball Signo DX again, until I got to the very last line, where I switched to the fine tip end of the Sharpie.
Zooming in on the word “cucchiata” which I wrote and erased with the Pilot Frixion. It took a bit of effort to get it this erased but you can still make it out. It also has a barely noticeable pinkish hue where I erased the word.
I didn’t have any issues with any of the pens or the pencil, as they all wrote without any blobbing or skipping.
We all know why I saved the Sharpie for the bottom of the page cuz yep, that fine tip Sharpie bled through. I didn’t even bother with the regular fat end of the Sharpie.
I enjoyed writing on the Fabriano paper. It was smooth, handled ink fairly well, though maybe don’t use your wettest inks and nibs with it, unless you don’t mind the occasional bleedthrough. For this reason, I wouldn’t recommend this for swatching inks, but it’s fine for writing or drawing that doesn’t involve heavy application of ink.
At around $6.50/A5 notebook, it is similar in price to its Clairefontaine equivalent (I’ve seen prices above and below that, so ymmv). I like that they come in different options for folks who prefer blank, dot, grid, or lined. These will be a great addition to my language learning exercise books, where I copy grammar notes, or in this case, short stories. I’m planning to put them in covers with elastics so I can carry multiple notebooks. Fabriano has been sold at some art stores for quite some time, but you can also find a selection of Fabriano at Dromgoole’s. I would expect to see them at more retailers as Chartpak continues to ramp up distribution of Fabriano.
(Disclaimer: All Fabriano products were sent free of charge for review by Chartpak. All other products are my own, except for the BlueDew which was sent to us for review back in 2022.)
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