(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!.)
Apologies for the delay in getting the 2024 California Pen Show (aka CAPS) recap out to you (I am getting a chuckle out of saying “CAPS Recap”). I spent less than 24 hours at home before getting on a red eye flight to DC for mid-winter vacation with the fam.
CAPS was back for its second year but rather than being held at last year’s LAX Marriott, it was back at the Torrance Marriott Redondo Beach, site of the last LA Pen Show in 2022. As a result, this recap is going to feel like a mashup of the 2022 LA Recap and the 2023 CAPS Recap. The TLDR version is - the show is run similarly to the other pen shows, with public hours on all the days as well as weekend pass/VIP hours, and is back at a hotel that is a bit more pen show friendly.
I was working at the Franklin-Christoph table so I had limited time to take pictures (and shop), but you wouldn’t know that based on the haul, lol. More on that later.
Welcome to the Gali…I mean, California Pen Show! (That crossbar through the A though…)
Frank Zhang of Nahvalur/Omas and Mario Campa of Toys from the Attic are co-owners/organizers of CAPS.
Frank was one of friendly faces at the registration desk on Thursday to check in vendors and weekend passholders. The room behind him was where the traders were set up for the day. There were also a few vendors set up there on Friday since they weren’t allowed to use part of the hallway until Sat/Sun.
A view of the hallway leading to the main ballroom entrance.
Jonathon Brooks of Carolina Pen Company was one of the vendors in the hallway - here he is, all smiles with pens ready to go! There was always a crowd in front of his table!
The Ikkaku Pan-Long (Coiling Dragon) Chinkin Pen was created in celebration of the Lunar Year of the Dragon.
Last year, the show was inadvertently scheduled during Super Bowl weekend, which resulted in a pretty slow Sunday (compared to prior years where Sunday was the only public day and ended up being the busiest day). This year, as with past LA shows, it was held during Presidents’ weekend. The show felt fairly well-attended, but never overly crowded. Most of the aisles were wide enough to accommodate the crowds.
Always a pleasure to be working with Dustin and Scott of Franklin-Christoph (PC: used with permission from violet_titration on IG)
View of the ballroom from the F-C table which was along the back wall.
I got to see the upcoming Pelikan 200 Orange Delight. OMG, I can’t wait until it’s released!
The Pelikan Edelstein Ink of the Year for 2024, Golden Lapis, was inked up in one of the M800s. It is a beautiful blue ink with gold shimmer - another one that I can’t wait to get my grabby hands on!
Poor Ian Schon of Schon Dsgn lost his voice on Friday and had to point customers to his helper Scott, who fielded questions all weekend.
I would not be as chipper as Ian if I lost my voice. 🙂
Like last year, there were many nib workers to choose from. I wasn’t able to get pictures of everyone but I was able to get some nib work done this weekend.
Along one of the back walls, Matthew Chen (left) and Mike Masuyama had long lists of folks waiting to get nibs ground.
On the other side of Matthew and Mike were Gena Salorino of Custom Nib Studio, as well as CY (below), and Anabelle Hiller who was there for fun (aka, not on behalf of Appelboom). And at the other end of the ballroom was Kirk Speer of Pen Realm who was grinding/tuning nibs as well as selling his wares.
CY was busy doing grinds all weekend and had helpers selling limited edition Japanese pens too.
DO NOT DO THIS AT HOME! I had to write on sandpaper before Anabelle did the rest of an architect grind. This allows her to get the exact angle that works for me! Talk about a custom grind! This was terrifying and felt oh-so-wrong, but Anabelle made it perfect!
I love that CAPS is becoming more of an international show, with vendors coming from all around the world. Last year, we had folks like Sarj Minhas, St John’s Pens and Ray Walters from the UK, Miroslav (Miro) Tischler from Croatia, Osman Sümer from Germany and others. This year, those folks returned and others joined them from Turkey, Italy and Japan and probably other places too!
John Foye of St. John’s Pens and his lovely family brought some stunning pens with them from the UK!
Giovanni Santini, founder of Santini Italia, with his wife Katrina, came from Italy for their first time at the CA Pen Show.
Studio Agackakan came all the way from Turkey to show off their beautiful pens.
Speaking of Turkey, Yunus of Galen Leather and his fiancee Meltem brought their beautiful leather and wood accessories with them.
It was so nice to see Takayuki Saito-san and the rest of the PLOTTER Japan and US teams at another US show! I had multiple people ask me “what was that table selling” since they were always swamped!
This is the first time that corner customization was an option in the US!
The Pilot Japan team joined Pilot USA and brought their handwriting analysis machine with them! I didn’t get a chance to take photos, but you can check out pictures of the experience if you scroll halfway down the recap from the 2023 DC pen show.
There were also local vendors, including some of my local favorites, Stacy Hills and family, Mai from Paper Treats, and Flax Pen-to-Paper, and local-ish (aka Bay Area/Northern California) folks like Christine Herrin of Everyday Explorers and Curnow Bookbinding and Leatherwork.
Stacy Hills and his talented family: wife Jill makes jewelry and pen wraps, while daughter Faith makes stickers and ceramics!
Had to take a selfie with the mascot of GLAMPIG (Greater Los Angeles Metro Pen & Ink Group)!
Steve Curnow of Curnow Bookbinding and Leather brought so many bound journals, notebooks and inserts, including A5 and pocket notebooks specially made for this show!
In addition to all the pens and things, it’s nice to see more and more pen-adjacent vendors at this (and other shows). As I mentioned in the SF show recap last year, it’s really nice to get a variety of vendors that span different products beyond pens and inks.
Christine Herrin (right) of Everyday Explorers, along with some of her creative team, brought her stamps, stickers and washi – all designed by her!
I managed to get a photo of local vendor, Mai of Paper Treats, before the show started because it was busy all weekend! Not only did she have super cute items, she’s also the nicest person too!
I love that Scott B. Jones draws something every day with one of his fountain pens! He’s made so many drawings that he’s published 4 books of his drawings, including this one!
Amongst some of the vendors that sold Japanese pens, especially those with urushi, maki-e and raden work, there was a lot of talk about the earthquake that devastated Wajimi, Japan earlier this year. There were several fundraising initiatives including an auction of items at the Taccia table as well as raffle tickets at Penlux.
Silent auction of beautiful works of art and craftsmanship at the Taccia table, with proceeds benefitting Maeda and Taya-San, who work to create the beautiful Taccia pens.
Penlux held a raffle for their Honoring Ishikawa pen; both the proceeds from the raffle and from sales of the pen will benefit Peace Winds America which is a non-profit helping Japanese folks affected by the earthquake.
Last year, one of the feedback I gave to the show organizers was that they did not have any classes or seminars. This year, they added several seminars from Fountain Pen Basics (by Lisa Vanness), Stationery for Everyday Writing (by Joe Crace of The Gentleman Stationer) and Dunhill, Namiki and Maki-e Pens (by Maz Farouki.) Some of the seminars were repeated on multiple days which was great since the show had a noticeable influx of newer users. I heard from both Lisa and Joe that all of their classes were full (25+ people each)!
Lisa Vanness teaching one of several classes/seminars held throughout the weekend.
The show felt fairly well-attended, most vendors did better on Friday than either Saturday or Sunday. Folks swarmed at several tables all weekend, but that didn’t necessarily translate into great sales for everyone. While some vendors had a great show, many of them had an “alright” weekend, and some did not do well at all. One lady who was here with her spouse and was selling vintage pens, said they sold 4 pens the entire weekend and told me that was nowhere near enough to cover the cost of attending the show. We weren’t sure if there would be a big crowd on Sunday, for the folks who were used to the past LA Pen Show’s “Sunday-only” public day, but it turned out to be a slightly smaller crowd on Sunday.
One other thing that I noticed at the F-C table, and also from other vendors, was that there were a lot more beginning fountain pen users at this show than they’ve experienced in the past. Both Lisa Vanness and Joe Crace, said that not only were most of their seminar attendees fairly new to fountain pens, quite a few of them didn’t even own a single fountain pen. I think this is great for our hobby’s future and it makes me excited to see new folks learning about FPs. Last time I felt like this was at the 2023 STL show and this show was similar from that perspective. Everyone is glad that there are new folks getting into fountain pens, but it often means that vendors spend more time and energy explaining their products (or just pens in general), and end up with fewer sales. In addition, budgets are often lower since they are just learning about all the brands and inks and products. So while the attendance was decent, sales weren’t as good as some vendors had hoped. Hopefully, this will change as the users get some more experience under their belt, so we shall see if that rings true next year!
Overall, this weekend felt really good - I’m glad we’re back at the Torrance Marriott (having food options at the mall across the street is awesome), and the bar/lobby had lots of hanging out spots. The show had a good combination of vintage and modern pen vendors as well as lots of “pen adjacent” vendors. I’m also glad that there were seminars, including several that were geared towards more novice users. I still think the show could do a better job of getting the word out via social media (7 posts, not including the “thank you for a great show” post). I’m eager to see how the show continues to adjust and grow.
To no one’s surprise, I bought a few things at the show (as shown below), but also got several pens ground (not pictured), including a Sakakusen (Naginata/Kodachi) grind from CY, an Architect by Anabelle, a Journaler by Gena and two CIs by Mike Masuyama.
My CAPS haul: Leather A5 cover (left) and “Pen Bed” (right) from Galen Leather, and rose gold corners for my existing Bible-size PLOTTER.
Top: Conklin Dusty Rose ink (from Yafa), Kobe A to A purple ink (from Nagasawa), Diamine Cappadocia (from Galen Leather). Bottom: Magenta Bible-size PLOTTER with rose gold corners (from PLOTTER USA), pocket notebook from Curnow Bookbinding and Leather, and California notepad (also from PLOTTER USA.)
CA Pen Show pen sleeve from Rickshaw Bagworks (on lanyard), washi tape and newspaper from Mai of Paper Treats.
As awesome as all the stuff is, I always say that the best part of pen shows is the people! This is the real haul.
I’m excited for the next show coming up: the Baltimore International Pen Show (which I will be at when this article is published) and possibly the Arkansas (!!!) and Chicago shows. I hope to see you there! Until then, stay warm, stay safe, and stay inky!
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