Leonardo Supernova Star Light Blue Fountain Pen Review

(Jeff Abbott is a regular contributor at The Pen Addict. You can find more from Jeff online at Draft Evolution and Twitter.)

This Leonardo Supernova that I've had on my desk the last couple of weeks has really stolen the show in terms of my stationery rotation. I couldn't pass it up when I saw it online, but seeing the pen in person is even more striking.

The Leonardo Supernova is a regular edition that features a beautiful marbled acrylic that is made in Italy. The color I have is called Star Light Blue with Ruthenium Trim, but there are three other colors options as well. All four materials are gorgeous, but I'm a sucker for bright blues and turquoise with hints of green.

The swirl of color in this material is one thing, but Leonardo added a little extra character by including a sprinkle of reflective particles that subtly sparkle and twinkle under the light. The sparkle gives the acrylic just a little more depth and visual interest that makes the pen pop.

The fit and finish of this pen is fantastic, and I was impressed by how well-made it is for the price. Everything lines up perfectly and feels solid in the hand, and the dark trim complements the bright blue body beautifully. The wide band features a geometric design that looks great without drawing attention away from the acrylic. Aside from the band, there's also a small ring at the bottom of the pen and a functional clip on the cap. The clip is a sleek shape and has a wheel at the end that makes it just a little easier to clip onto things while still keeping the pen secure.

The Supernova sports a steel #6 Jowo nib with some decorative scroll work and the nib size inscribed at the base. The dark nib matches the rest of the trim on the pen and continues that delicious contrast between the dark metal and bright acrylic. The fine nib on this pen was smooth and crisp out of the box, and flows well with the couple of inks I've already tried with it.

Writing with the Supernova is fantastic due to the smooth nib and even balance of the pen body. You can post the cap on the back of the pen, but I prefer leaving it unposted since it's a full-size fountain pen. I like the balance without the cap a little better, but just know that the cap posts securely if you like to write with the additional weight. No one likes a loose cap on the back of the pen when trying to write!

Along with the pen and gift box, Leonardo include a standard cartridge converter so that you can ink the pen up with your favorite ink. I wish more pen manufacturers would do this instead of including a couple of generic black or blue ink cartridges!

From when I first saw the Leonardo Supernova on Goldspot's website, I had high expectations. At $152, it's not a cheap pen, and straddles a really interesting and competitive price point. At a minimum, it needs to perform like other amazing pens that you can buy at this price. I'm happy to say that this pen exceeds my expectations. It's a pleasure to use, and it looks so awesome on my desk. I can't help but pick it up and twirl it around under the light to admire the personality in the acrylic.

Aside from the fine nib, you have the option of extra fine, medium, broad, elastic extra fine, elastic fine, and 1.5mm stub. And good luck picking just one color out of this exceptional lineup of materials!

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

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Kilk Orient Fountain Pen Review

(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!.)

Color me shocked when the Bossman sent me a pen for review and it was orange! It was the Kilk Orient - I had never heard of the brand Kilk, so I was eager to check it out and see how it performed.

Kilk is a pen company that was founded in 2012 in Istanbul, Turkey. They have several models of fountain pens in addition to the Orient.

The pen comes with a steel “V2 nib” (per Goldspot, it is a #6 Bock) engraved with the Kilk logo and nib size. The pen also comes with a screw-in standard international converter as well as a polishing cloth for cleaning the silver band and instructions on how to care for the pen. The pen comes with a 2 year warranty against manufacturing defects.

The first thing I noticed was how distinctive the shape is. It has its own look and doesn’t really look like other pens out in the market. The second thing I noticed was the silver band and trim, as in 925 silver, not just silver colored. You don’t see actual silver accents on a pen in this (or any) price point very often. The band design is classy and detailed without being overly intricate or busy.

The cap is quite large and has an almost bulbous shape to it. The clip band sits a little lower down from the tip of the cap (reminds me a little of vintage Pelikan caps) and the clip point is very pointy, maybe a little too pointy. The clip works well and easily slides over my binder’s elastic straps as well as over shirt pockets. The metal band is not on the cap, as is often the case with other pens, but on the barrel of the pen. To me, it looks a little odd but this is definitely personal preference and does not affect writing performance since the band sits between one’s fingers and the crook of the hand. The barrel of the pen is also a bit curvy, with a slight flare at the nib which prevents fingers from sliding down. The taper on the other end also allows you to post the cap fairly deeply without making it too back-weighted.

Pen still feels fairly balanced when posted, though it does extend a ways back. Of course, I would prefer this one (and all pens) unposted.

The Orange Orient is made from a beautiful bright orange acrylic that has swirls of chatoyance and is slightly translucent. You can just barely see the converter if you look carefully. The material is highly polished and can feel a bit slick, especially if you live/work in a more humid environment. The Kilk Orient is well-made and doesn’t feel cheap or flimsy in any way even though it isn’t a heavy pen.

Slightly translucency of the material.

Comparison to similarly sized pens (L to R): Opus 88 Halo, Leonardo Momento Zero, Kilk Orient, Pelikan M800, Pilot Custom 823, Visconti Homo Sapiens.

You can really see how much girthier the Kilk Orient grip and body are compared to the others.

Despite it’s girth, it is the shortest pen when posted.

As I’ve mentioned in past reviews, I know it’s good advice to rinse/clean pens prior to first use but honestly, I’m lazy and too eager to try out new pens, so I went ahead and inked it up with Visconti Cafe Terrace at Night without any cleaning. The Fine nib was smooth but the writing experience felt a bit dry. Hard to tell if it was the nib or the ink so I flushed out the converter and nib and put in good ol’ Waterman Serenity Blue.

The nib didn’t perform much better with Serenity Blue. It wasn’t hard starting or anything like that but the ink just didn’t seem to flow very well. I used my loupe to check for any misalignment or baby’s bottom and there wasn’t any but since I wasn’t sure my loupe handling skills should be trusted, I took it to the Philly Pen Show to have it looked at by a professional. I asked Gena Salorino of Custom Nib Studio to take a quick peek (without making any nib modifications) and they agreed that it was a bit on the dry side, so phew, it wasn’t just me. The nib is usable as-is but I think it would be so much better with a little bit of tuning. According to Goldspot, the nibs are tested and tuned in the Kilk workshop before being exported so maybe they don’t tune them as much for a wetter flow.

The Kilk Orient fountain pen costs $260 USD with a steel nib and is available from EF to BB. A gold nib option is available from the Kilk website for $380. The aesthetics of the Kilk Orient fountain pen aren’t really my jam, but I appreciate that it is a different design that doesn’t look like every other pen out there. I also like that it has real silver accents, which does add to the price, though it is still in the range of many custom pens. Given its unique styling, the Kilk Orient pen may not be for everyone, but if you like how it looks and appreciate the addition of real silver trim, this might be a good addition to your collection.

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

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In the Footsteps of the Pen Addict - Choosing a Spoke Icon

(Note from Brad: Since I wouldn’t review this pen myself, my friend Diane asked if she could step in and tackle a product I had a direct hand in making. This is her review below. Thank you Diane!)

In early 2021, Spoke Design introduced not one but 3 fountain pens - the Icon, Axle and Axle S. All 3 designs are available in a variety of mix and match color combinations.

Right away I wanted to get at least one of these pens, but. which? I loved all 3, and it took time to narrow down the choices. Despite its cuteness, I managed to eliminate the tiny Axle S because of its cartridge-only filling system. While the Axle’s tool-like aesthetic was appealing and I liked the threaded posting, I found the Icon the most intriguing with its open 6-slotted barrel revealing a contrasting inner sleeve. Soon after the release, alternative grips including a knurled version were added for the Icon only.

For a while I held out for a pen show where I could evaluate the models in person, but over a year passed with no pen shows attended by Spoke.

I had decided that I wanted the knurled grip and sleeve in the same color, with a surprise color contrast to the cap and barrel. Of all the knurled grip colors, I liked the cyan best. That just left the choice of cap and barrel color.

I found the gunmetal or silver combination with cyan too conservative; the purple and cyan, on the other hand, seemed too gaudy.

Time passed, and the unfinished business of choosing an Icon remained. Meanwhile the colors slowly sold out and my choice was made - cobalt blue and cyan.

First impressions

The pen arrived securely packed in foam-line tin within a Spoke Design logo box,. In the website photos, the Icon looks like a chunky, heavy pen. In fact it’s smaller than I expected and also at 23.6g capped, it weighs about the same as a Lamy Safari, substantially less than most of the pens I use daily. There are benefits to lighter weight and benefits to substance. The option of brass grip and insert may allow the pen to be customized to be heavier if that’s preferred.

From the top: Rotring 600 pencil; Rotring Newton; Lamy Al-Star; Spoke Icon; Diplomat Aero; Levenger L-Tech.

Fitting a new pen into my life When taking handwritten notes in meetings, I like a pen with an efficient, geometric, logical appearance; unconventional but not flamboyant. I also have a dread of a pen drying up while uncapped, so I like to use either a snap cap or a retractable. My go-tos are Rotring Newton, Diplomat Aero, Pilot Vanishing Point and Platinum Curidas, all with EF nibs. My heptagonal, F nibbed Levenger L-Tech could be a runner up here as it channels the Rotring design aesthetic; although it’s not a snap cap, it can be uncapped in less than a full turn.

For daily ephemeral work notes and sketches, I use my notetaking pen du jour, something else from rotation, plus a stub or architect with a different colored ink for accents and separators.

When flying, I value pens that don’t dry out if left unused for a while as I believe this makes them more resistant to air pressure changes and leaking. Kaweco Al-Sport, Schon DSGN pocket 6, Esterbrook Estie and Platinum 3776 have served well here; the retractables stay at home.

For home note-taking and journaling, abalone and crazy resins are welcome as well as modern flex nibs, stubs and italics.

Viewed through this lens, the Spoke Icon has the logical, geometric aesthetic that I like for the office. It wrote instantly and did not leak after 2 flights with 2 weeks of non-use over the holidays. In the months since obtaining the Icon, it has been a daily driver for work and home.

Usability

Unlike its Axle siblings, the Icon is not designed to post. At first glance the cutouts look like they are there to provide roll stop behavior. They don’t - the pen rolls easily and when placed on a desk, defensive measures are necessary.

The Icon’s barrel has an o-ring that prevents it from unscrewing on its own, and attempts to unscrew the cap don’t cause the barrel to come undone. The cap thread does not make contact with fingers while in use. One downside is that the cap has a single thread and takes over 3 full rotations to undo. While this provides for a moment of quiet meditation when uncapping the pen, it makes it a less than ideal choice for meeting notes.

Grip choices

There’s a special fatigue caused by writing with a slippery pen. The mental energy required to keep control of the pen is not available for the thought processes involved in writing. The first time I picked up a pen with a knurled grip, I experienced an unexpected peace and increased focus.

Until the Icon, I only had two knurled grip writing instruments - a Rotring 600 pencil and the Rotring-inspired Levenger L-Tech fountain pen. I received all 3 available grip variants with my Icon and rated each on the following factors:

Grip Comfort - 1 minimum, 5 maximum, higher is better.

Slip vs grip - 1 slippery, 5 grippy, higher is better.

The Icon’s concave grip scored 5; it is one of the most comfortable grips I have ever used. However, it scored 2 on the slip versus grip scale, being slippery both longitudinally and rotationally.

The Icon’s groove grip scored 3 for comfort and 4 for slip vs grip; longitudinal slip is gone but rotational slip remains.

The Icon’s knurled grip scored 4 for comfort, dropping a point relative to the concave, and a perfect 5 for grip.

While the Levenger L-Tech also scored 4 + 5 due to its knurled grip, both the Rotring Newton and Diplomat Aero have unforgiving straight slippery grips, scoring 2+2 = 4 each.

Retractables have their own grip comfort challenges, which I see as a necessary compromise for retractable functionality, so I won’t rate them here.

The knurled grips are clear winners in this highly subjective evaluation. The surprise is just how badly I rate two of my go-to pens in comparison.

Spoke Icon Concave Grip.

Spoke Icon Groove Grip.

Filling

The Icon uses standard cartridge / converter filling and with the barrel sleeve in place, there’s no ink window. The sleeve can be removed with the available tool in order to replace it with a different color. Removing the sleeve completely gives a view of the ink level in the converter, at the expense of the flash of contrasting color from the sleeve. It’s worth noting that the sleeve is open ended, so if the cartridge or converter were dislodged, ink could escape from the barrel. This is also a consideration for the Lamy Safari and Al-Star; I have never had it happen with either. The main downside of the knurled grip is that when filling from an ink bottle, ink may get into the knurled texture and is then hard to remove. Even when it seems to be gone, tiny amounts of ink remain and transfer to fingers when writing. There are many ways to avoid this - rinsing the grip after filling, syringe-filling the converter, filling the converter from the bottle or from a TSWBI inkwell - and I’m happy to use these methods in return for the knurled grip.

Nib Heaven

The nib is always the most important part of any pen and yet in this case, also the least important. Since the Icon takes a standard Jowo #6 nib unit, any other Jowo #6 will fit, giving access to needlepoint, stub, fine cursive italic, modern semi-flex, architect and more from a variety of sources.

The Spoke Icon is available with a standard Jowo #6 nib unit in EF, F, M and B, all engraved with the Spoke logo. I selected the Jowo #6 EF somewhat reluctantly as I already have several in other pens. I have come to think of the Jowo #6 EF as Heaven - every time I come back to it, I marvel at its precise, clean line, reliability and ease of use. But it’s Heaven by the Talking Heads - the ennui of perfection.

Conclusion

The Spoke Icon is everything I hoped it would be. Its clean but unconventional design suits me both at work and at home. It sparks joy when its cyan accents flash through the barrel cutouts or appear when the cap is removed. Its knurled grip allows me to focus on writing. Its nib is perfect and also easily replaced. And I can live with the 3 turns to remove the cap.

As I made arrangements to get the Icon’s nib tailored to UEF and obtain a reverse architect / engineering nib, I reflected on one of my all-time favorites - the gold fine cursive italic in the Lamy Dialog, purchased from the Pen Addict during a previous herd-thinning event.

For me, this is all that’s missing from the Spoke Icon - it would be great to be able to order a Spoke pen pre-sprinkled with Pen Addict nib magic.

(I received the Spoke Icon at no charge in return for this unbiased review.)