Musubi Cosmo Air Light 83 Notebook Review

In the conversation surrounding Tomoe River paper replacements, one name has stood out among the contenders: Cosmo Air Light. And thankfully, one of the premier notebook makers in the world has added it as an option to their popular paper notebook lineup.

The Musubi Cosmo Air Light 83 Notebook features 208 pages of this highly fountain pen friendly paper. The A5 sized, semi-rigid cover gives the notebook great protection, and you can choose from three different paper styles - blank, 7 mm lined, or 5 mm cross grid. The lined and cross grid rulings each have subtle added markings on the page to help you setup your page for planning, bullet journaling, note taking, meetings, and more. To top it off, these notebooks will only cost you around $25, making them one of Musubi’s lowest-priced offerings.

With all that said, the real question is this: How does the paper perform? I’ll let Daryl from Musubi start this section off:

“Originally designed as a lightly-coated paper for book printing, Cosmo Air Light's most unique quality is its surface texture, which feels a little like a velvety dry-erase board, and spreads ink out slightly instead of pooling it in a single spot. As a result, inks sheen vividly and shade vibrantly, bringing out elements of colour and contrast in ways often unrivaled even by papers like Tomoe River.”

Cosmo Air Light is great for fountain pens. The ink colors are bright on the page, and the dry time is moderate - giving the ink a chance to shade and sheen well. There is a softness to the page as the nib glides across it, with little to no feedback. It’s almost glossy, but not slick. It’s hard to explain, but it feels great with fountain pens.

One thing I definitely noticed, and Daryl mentioned above, is that my lines seemed wider on this paper than with other papers. For example, my fine nibs left more of a medium-width line. The finer I went, the more I noticed it. My fine cursive italic Nakaya nib was not as fine I am used to, nor was my Platinum 3776 UEF.

For standard pens and pencils, I found the Cosmo Air Light paper too glossy for enjoyable regular use. If you grab a ballpoint pen and go write on a thick magazine page, that is the feel you get. Glassy smooth, with no feedback. Same with pencils, which needs a page with texture to be enjoyable in my book. Rollerball and gel pens were passable, leaving rich-colored lines which would look great as sketches, but I’m not sure I would want to write page after page with either of those inks.

Fountain pens are the way to go with Cosmo Air Light. And may be the only way. That kind of sounds like Tomoe River paper, doesn’t it? This is a fountain pen only paper for the most part, and fortunately it does that part well. If you like big colors, big nibs, big ink, and big lines, then you are going to love Cosmo Air Light.

You are also going to love the construction, quality, and story of Musubi notebooks. They are the best in my book, and at around $25 for the Cosmo Air Light version, it is a great value.

(Musubi provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

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Leuchtturm1917 Reporter Notepad Review

(Sarah Read is an author, editor, yarn artist, and pen/paper/ink addict. You can find more about her at her website and on Twitter. And check out her latest book, Out of Water, now available where books are sold!)

For someone who loves notebooks so much, I sure do write a lot on scratch paper. The back of a receipt? In the margins of an unrelated document? On a tiny square of paper saved from the recycling bin? Post-it notes? That's where I write the most important things. What could possibly go wrong? Everything, that's what. And I'm forever looking for solutions to save me from myself.

Leuchtturm1917 are well established as quality notebooks, and I love using their standard A5 model, so I was pleased to see that the Reporter Notepad has all the same features. A smooth leather hardcover with an elastic band closure keeps everything secure. Inside, there's a name page, followed by a few pages for an index. I was surprised to see the index for a small notepad--but these pages are numbered, just like in their larger notebooks. This is extra useful, as the things that get written in this sort of book tend to be random and disorganized. The index will save me from having to flip through the book looking for random notes.

This notepad has grid lines in faint grey on 94 sheets of cream paper. That's 188 pages if you use both sides--which is trickier to do with a notepad, but I'll do it. There's a small margin at the top of each page for a header, and a narrow margin around the bottom and sides, giving the edges a clean look.

Inside the back cover is their usual pocket for bits of paper--just in case you still write on scraps. You'll be less likely to, though, because this notepad offers an excellent writing experience. The paper is fantastic, standing up to nearly any ink. Even the Sharpie only showed through where the pen tip paused. The rest has almost no show-through. The binding on this is also sturdy enough that it can be folded back around on itself, if you want to hold it compactly.

Overall, this may be one of the best reporter-style notepads I've used. Most that I've tried are spiral-bound, which works for the flip-over, but they don't hold onto papers as well, tend to get warped, and snag in pockets. They also lack the fancy features that Leuchtturm adds, like the pocket and index. I'm hoping this book will help me cut down on scrap writing, especially at work, where I scribble a note every few minutes. Maybe someday I'll find the three separate scraps of paper that all have the same chiropractor recommendation on them, but in the meantime, I'll just have to ask for that rec one more time, and write it safely in this book.

(JetPens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

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Write Notepads The Engineer Notebook Review

The Write Notepads Engineer Notebook is the notebook of my young Pen Addict dreams. And it’s pretty darn great for my older self as well.

When I was a kid, I used to hunt down engineering notebooks from the LSU campus bookstore. This is the store where many of stationery discoveries originated from, and finding those odd looking, brown-marbled cover gems was always a highlight. You weren’t going to find these on your middle school supplies list, that’s for sure.

The Engineer Notebook is Write’s take on this classic design, and they have done it right. From the cover - made from wear resistant Oilboard - to the light yellow paper, to the grid on top of grid format, this notebook is a retro dream.

So, how does it handle our modern tools? Pretty well, unless you are a fountain pen die-hard. Write’s pocket notebooks are notoriously fountain pen friendly, but the same doesn’t apply for this paper. Write mentions as much in the product description, which I greatly appreciate from them. In practice, my extra fine nibs worked well on the page, and medium and greater nibs feathered a good amount. I wouldn’t enjoy writing page after page with a wide, wet nib.

What I would enjoy is writing with everything else in the Engineer Notebook. Gel, ballpoint, rollerball, pencil, fineliner - all were excellent. The paper has a little tooth, which makes pencils feel exceptional, but not enough to notice with even the finest of standard pens.

Now, there are a ton of notebooks on the market that fit the description of average with fountain pens and great with everything else. So, what makes this one a notebook you should consider? Quality, design, and nostalgia.

Write Notepads put a lot of thought and care into the production of the Engineer Notebook. The square size (7” x 7”) is unique, as are the paper color and grid layout. And there is an even larger 8.5” x 11” Memo Pad option. I’m clearly a fan, and have the pens, pencils, and ideas to fill it with. You will have to to determine how you will use it, and what you will use in it.

Regardless of anything else, Write has added another great product to an ever expanding product lineup, and I look forward to seeing what’s next.

(I paid regular retail price from Write Notepads for the product in this review. I also have a separate business/wholesale relationship with the company.)

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Enjoy reading The Pen Addict? Then consider becoming a member to receive additional weekly content, giveaways, and discounts in The Pen Addict shop. Plus, you support me and the site directly, for which I am very grateful.

Membership starts at just $5/month, with a discounted annual option available. To find out more about membership click here and join us!