(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!.)
Philly is one of my favorite shows to attend, despite it being held in the middle of January and it being one of the smaller pen shows. Why? Because it is the first pen show of the year and really helps set the tone for the rest of the year. As mentioned in my 2022 Pen Show Recap, this will theoretically be a shorter read (yeah, right) because I won’t be as in-depth as I was for last year’s Philly recap. Let’s see what the show was like this year, shall we?
For the first time, the show was held on the main ballroom floor whereas it was in the mezzanine level in prior years.
Outside the show, there is a lot of room to sit and relax and hang up your coats.
Smiling friendly faces (Mike, Eleanor, Eric Orozco (one of the show organizers), Cindy and Dan) were there to greet you, answer questions and get you registered for the show.
The show was spread out over two larger, adjacent ballrooms with much higher ceilings, giving the room a much more spacious feel.
You can see how much taller the room is compared to last year’s ballroom.
Fountain Pen Hospital made the short trek from NYC with lots of pens!
Some beautiful Taccia releases that are giving off some Decapod vibes!
Always wonderful to see the cheerful Link Tong of Roses Without Thorns and his gorgeous pop-up cards!
My go-to for vintage flex is Myk Daigle who is double-checking a newly-inked flex pen.
Paul Erano, aka The Grand Poobah of the Black Pen Society, even has some non-black pens to sell!
The first stop for me is always the Franklin-Christoph table, even if I have to squeeze in to get a closer look.
The insides of their new 48-pen case which uses the same 6-pen inserts as their smaller cases.
Oh the eye candy at the Schon Dsgn table! Look at the fade on these faceted Pocket 6 pens!
Several folks, including myself, were able to pick up our pre-ordered, in-house Schon Monoc nibs at the show (mine is in the teal pen at the bottom.)
Ian Schon, the smiling face of the genius behind Schon DSGN.
Scott B. Jones has published several books of his drawings made with fountain pens!
When I want modern flex custom made to match my preferences, Les of Stylosuite is where I go! His table was busy all weekend long, so I’m going to have to try to get something at his next show.
There was a second, adjoining ballroom which had about as many tables as the first room and included folks like Kenro Industries, Luxury Brands of America and many others.
Luxury Brands of America had an impressive array of products from Platinum, Waldmann, Benu and more.
LBA recently added Endless to the brands they distribute - the new Endless notebooks with Regalia Paper was a big seller.
Esterbrook just released these brand new pen wraps (foreground) and stand-up pen “cups” (background). They sold out of the pen cups before I had a chance to buy one!
Rainbow Yeung and helper Albert have cool notebooks with Tomoe River and Cosmo Air Light. I love that they have space and Greek/Roman themed covers!
Daniel Street (on the right) of Street Pens and helper were also in the left ballroom and carried a wide variety of brands and products.
Don’t ever think that amazing finds like this Montblanc Creation Lalique Desk Set can only be found at “the big shows”!
Nib workers were evenly spaced out between the two ballrooms with Damien Alomar of All in the Nib and Gena Salorino of Custom Nib Studio in the first ballroom and JC Ament of The Nib Tailor and Josh of JJ Lax Pen Co in the second ballroom.
Damien is all smiles when he’s at a pen show!
Gena was busy all weekend!
JC working hard on this nib.
Josh getting started on this grind.
I didn’t work at this show, but instead, shared a table with my good pal, Mike Matteson of Inkdependence, where we both hawked our respective wares.
Audrey stopped by to help Mike show off some of the stuff he was selling, including ink samples!
I did my usual “have too much fun every night that I forgot to take pictures”, but the night scene was similar to past years, only more crowded this year. The United Soccer Coaches convention was held at the hotel along with the 2023 Liberty Bell Open (part of the Continental Chess Association series of tournaments), making it a lot busier than usual. In fact, if you didn’t book your hotel room before the room block ran out, they had rooms that cost upwards of $500-800/night. Nearby hotels had regular room rates, so some folks stayed elsewhere.
I was told that all of the tables were sold out and attendance was higher than last year. Folks I talked to said that it felt like an almost “back to normal” pen show experience. The lack of inclement weather helped. It was chilly and windy (it is mid-January, after all) but it wasn’t snowy or rainy. The show traffic on Friday felt lighter than at other shows. In fact, I was kind of nervous that I had only sold one pen for $75. Thankfully, Saturday was much busier and felt like a normal bustling show day. I saw many friends who made the trek from NYC and the DC Metro area on Saturday. And, as with most shows, Sunday was much quieter. There were still folks wandering around from 3-4pm, looking for last minute deals and making their final pen show purchases. Vendors seemed pleased with how the weekend went and were excited for their next show, whether it be the upcoming California Pen Show in 3 weeks or the Baltimore Pen Show in March. I’ll be at both, so I hope to see you soon! Until then, stay warm and stay inky!
So much for my “no more inks until I swatch more” resolution, lol - top to bottom - Sailor Pro Gear Skeleton Turquoise, Schon Full Size Teal Fade (with Monoc nib), Franklin-Christoph Philly Pen Show 2023 45L, Nahvalur Inks, Robert Oster NY Metropolitian Pen Show ink, Franklin-Christoph Ink ‘23.
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