One More For The Road

Third week of April, third week hitting the road!

This week, I’m headed to Memphis, Tennessee to visit St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital to prep for our big Relay fundraiser in September. Since 2019, the Relay community has raised over $4 Million for this amazing cause, and I’m glad to play even a tiny role in this.

Travel means my schedule is wonky once again this week, but aside from my regular streams things will run mostly as normal. I even have a first time guest on The Pen Addict Podcast this week, which I think you will all enjoy.

Check out the schedule on my status page, and come hang out for a random Monday stream at 10 a.m. Eastern. See you soon!

A Fountain Pen Lovers Guide to Paris in 2025

(This is a guest post by Eric Nuzum. Eric is a writer from Montclair, New Jersey on a quest to just write legibly for once in his life. That quest led him to fall in love with fountain pens and now wishes “ink sommelier” was an actual job.)

What does Paris have to offer a visiting fountain pen enthusiast?

This should be an easy question to answer. Paris is the City of Lights…the City of Love….a high point of European art, culture, design, and sophistication. And France has had an illustrious history with writing instruments, home to Waterman, ST Dupont, J Herbin, Clairefontaine/Rhodia, and other prestigious historic brands (let alone the country where Bic still manufactures a billion Cristal pens every year).

Surely the answer is plentiful, right?

Not so fast.

I recently found myself asking this question before a family trip to Paris over the holidays to visit my wife’s cousin. I was surprised by how little current information I was able to find. Most blog posts and Reddit threads I found were a decade old–and after some quick searching, it seemed that some of the most often-mentioned stores didn’t make it through the pandemic era. So I took some scraps of information I found, excused myself from my family for a few hours every day, and proceeded to hunt. I thought I’d share what I found to help future Paris visitors make the most of your time.

Let’s start with my favorites:

L’Ecritoire (26 Passage Molière–a quick walk from Hotel de Ville)

The name translates to “writing case” or “inkwell” and lived up to its name. It is a small store hidden in an alley, but the entire shop is dedicated to writing instruments and material. There is a modest collection of fountain pens from traditional budget and midrange brands, a small collection of inks (including a few of their own ink line), and an impressive collection of less-common items, like actual quills cut to be pens, glass pens, and other writing ephemera.

I saw this in a number of stores, including here at L’ Ecritoire: vintage stationery items and bottles of ink–some still full–displayed on top of retail shelves.

Most of the store space is dedicated to paper, cards, and journals–and the collection is very impressive. In all, a lovely curated selection of items. I highly recommend and would visit here again.

My haul from this store: Two petite bottles of their house inks (Blue Nuit and Prune), a nice nib holder, a wax seal, and a set of six of their house sealing wax sticks.

Magasin Sennelier (3 Quai Voltaire, directly across the Seine from the Louvre Museum)

If you were a location scout and a movie studio called and said “Find us an old looking art supply store as a setting for scenes in our late 19th century movie,” you would get a bonus for pointing them to Sennelier. It is Paris’s oldest art supply store–and just across the river from the Louvre and down the street from the Musee D’Orsay to boot. The fixtures, cabinets, and display cases, are all vintage–as well as things like the thin, winding staircases and incredibly wonky floors.

Image via the Magasin Sennelier website.

At first you might think Sennelier is just a really cool old art supply store, but I’d advise a perilous climb up to the 3rd floor, where you’ll find their collection of drawing, calligraphy, fountain pens, ink, markers, and supplies, plus the largest collection of handmade Japanese papers (including large rolls) that I’d ever seen anywhere. There’s a broad selection of J. Herbin, Sailor, Pilot, and a few other ink lines. Not a very wide range of fountain pens in sight (though an impressive collection of art markers), but there was quite a number of calligraphy nibs and nib holders.

My haul from this store: Two 10ml bottles of Pilot Iroshizuku Tsuki-yo and Tsutsuji ink (while I could buy these inks many places, I’d never seen smaller bottles like these before).

Melodies Graphiques (10 Rue du Pont Louis-philippe in The Marais) Two twin storefronts, side by side, with separate entrances lead to an amazing collection of paper, writing instruments, cards, journals, and other calligraphy and stationery items. To be honest, this place felt kinda magical. There is a lot that’s unusual about this store, including its array of opening hours. We first tried to visit on a day they were completely closed (to be fair, we were there the week between Christmas and New Years), and we could see little beyond the slightly dusty and sun-bleached window displays. Yet you could tell from those that the store had an impressive collection of items, including pens and inks, but couldn’t really tell what was going on inside until we returned the next day. And boy, was it worth the return trip.

In addition to a beautiful and extensive collection of stationery of all kinds, the store had an incredible vibe: part sideshow, part Victorian parlour, part artist’s studio, and part museum.

More old ink bottles.

The store had so much to offer that I went through each side twice to take it all in. I’d probably rate this a must see and would put it on the top of any list of fountain pen enthusiast destinations in Paris.

My haul from this store: Three bottles of Callifolio ink (Oconto, Gris de Payne, and Bleu Azur), two reproductions of antique calligraphy workbooks (entirely in French, which I don’t speak at all, but hey, pretty letters are pretty letters), and a lovely 10-pack of printed and embossed cards (that are fountain pen friendly).

Now, the “mixed bag”:

Palais du Stylo. A tiny brick and mortar pen store near the Paris Opera House. While any pen retailer is something to celebrate, for a visitor to Paris, the store offers little that you couldn’t find on dozens of web sites and retailers. Lots of mid-range pens from Lamy, Pilot, Waterman, Cross, Montegrappa, Parker, and more. Probably more useful to locals than anything to offer to out of town visitors.

Point Plume. A higher end boutique, again, with a selection of pens easily found almost anywhere, but this time quality brands like Montblanc, Sailor, Namiki, ST Dupont, Pelikan and others. It is the kind of store that you need to be buzzed through the front door in order to browse. The only inks and accessories they had were tied to the brands they carried. While a beautiful assortment of pens, there was nothing that would compel most out-of-towners.

Department Stores. Many of the threads and posts I’d read directed readers to visit major department stores, which all supposedly had stationery departments. I found this to technically be true, but often I’d have to fight my way through a large department store to find the “stationery department”--which amounted to a small display of Moleskine and Leuchtturm1917 notebooks and journals and maybe a few pens (but rarely fountain pens). I’ve heard there were some exceptions, but gave up on pursuing these after a few strikeouts.

The one exception I found was Le BVH Marais at 52 Rue de Rivoli–a massive department store that I visited on my second attempt to see Melodies Graphiques (which is only two blocks away). What I saw there was one of the most impressive stationery departments I’d ever seen inside a large retailer, anywhere. And a huge emphasis on French pens, inks, and paper products. I’d totally put this on a short list of places to visit, if for no other reason than the great collection of French products.

Oddly, I didn’t pick up anything here, but it was a welcome and impressive collection.

I had a few strikeouts too.

Buci News. Every post and thread I read pointed me towards a tiny store in the Latin Quarter called Buci News. I found it, but immediately noticed that the name “Buci News” was no longer on the front of the store. Inside, it was more of a cross between a convenience store and an office supply store. There was a selection of Rhodia paper pads, but little else that would be considered “stationery” items.

Le Carré d’Encre. Again, this store was present on many lists and was still open. Its name translates to “The Ink Square” so I figured it would be a hit. But unfortunately it was closed for the holidays.

Overall, I’d say I was a bit underwhelmed by what I found in Paris. Some stores that were definitely worth seeing and seeking out, but in a city like Paris, especially considering the French history with writing instruments and stationery, I expected more. That said, if any fountain pen and ink enthusiast finds themselves in Paris, hunting down these shops not only gives you a taste of the city you might otherwise miss, but also is a gratifying way to show and share your love for fine writing.

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A Stationery Trip to Japan

(This is a guest Post from Sam Alpert. Sam is a geologist, gamer, and general lover of all things with good, clean design. See more from Sam on Instagram @samalpert.)

I love Japan. I love the country, it’s gorgeous. I love the food, it’s incredible. I love the language, it’s fascinating. I love the culture, it’s epic. I love the queueing, I love the conbini, I love the transit, I love the art, I love the bureaucracy, and of course, I love the stationery. I don’t want to come across as someone who worships the place unconditionally (though you might be rolling your eyes at that statement with an intro like that). I know, it has many, deep-rooted issues. And no, you’re right, I haven’t lived there, I’ve only spent a total of about three weeks there so far, and mostly in major cities. I know that I have rose-tinted glasses, but I hope that I am a conscious enough person to still know what I like and Japan has it in spades. In a different world I’d live there but it wasn’t in the cards (though not for lack of trying, two of the PhD programs I applied to were there, but sadly the funding wasn’t).

So when I say I am so excited to tell you all about the trip I took to Tokyo in October, I want you to hear the passion. I want you to feel the energy behind every detail. I want to pull you in and get you as hyped up as I was stepping off the plane in Narita. For those of you who’ve been, I want to share that passion with you, and for those who are curious or already planning to go, I want to stoke the fire.

Oh, quick disclaimer, I’m not going to cover literally everything we did. Brad would kill me. So if you’re wondering, “but wait, what did you do for dinner on day X?” or “what was your favorite conbini fried chicken?” (Famichiki at FamilyMart, not close,) ask me elsewhere. I have to be concise … or, failing that as I always do, not too long-winded.

So where to start?

Well, it’s a stationery blog after all, so let’s just start there.

As luck would have it, my partner is equally into stationery, albeit different things. She loves stickers and I mean really LOVES them. She is less into fountain pens, but that’s great, it means we get to hype each other up about the things the other finds.

After a barely adequate 6 hours of sleep we both woke up on our first full day amped to go to our first store: Maruzen Ginza. It was incredible, I got to hold one of the highly unusual titanium Nakayas. Hot take: it was pretty meh. Too heavy, and the threads were scratchy. Honestly, Schon DSGN makes a cleaner machined pen.

Loaded up with our first haul of stickers, a planner, and some Maruzen brand Athena ink, we headed to the promised land, Itoya Ginza. This epic place has been well covered, but it lives up to the hype. Let me hit you with a couple pro tips that I don’t think a lot of people cover. First, skip the 11th floor unless you love looking at hydroponically grown lettuce through a glass window. Next, if you cross the ground floor from the main entrance and go out the “back” door there is an express elevator directly to your left that is very helpful for getting to upper floors and is much less busy than the severely overworked main elevator. Finally, the main store is called G.Itoya. Right out the back door slightly diagonally across the road is a smaller secondary store called K.Itoya. It’s a beautiful space that’s much less crowded and is where they showcase the in-house items, including gorgeous felt pencil cases and some seriously impressive maki-e work.

A little peek at just some of the small items I’m not even going to have time to mention where all of them came from individually. We could have literally filled an entire suitcase with just cute stickers, stamps, and washi tape.

I’d come on the trip thinking I wanted a Namiki, but after checking Maruzen the writing was on the wall, I wasn’t in love with them like I thought I’d be (and the selection was down, the aftereffects of overhype for them and the earthquake still wreaking havoc on distribution of lacquer pieces). In Itoya, the salesperson was so patient, she let me try so many pens, including a Namiki Emperor Urishi. But the pen I kept coming back to was a Sailor King of Pen ebonite Syokei limited edition. The factory custom Naginata medium fine nib was unlike anything I’d ever tried, but it was also about double what I’d come prepared to spend.

So I needed to think on it.

Fortunately, it was lunch time, and here is where I’ll take some liberty and say that I think everyone should try conveyor belt sushi from Sushiro. Yes, it’s cheap sushi, but it’s just so darn fun. I don’t care, I’d go again. I loved it. You get so much sushi for cheap. Did I have better sushi (more on that in a sec) elsewhere? Yes. But did I have more fun sushi? Nah. Watching my partner’s eyes light up as her sushi was diverted down the express lane to our table was worth every penny of the trip, and it was only day 1.

But you all know where this is going. That lunch only made the itch harder to ignore. So yes, back to Itoya we went, and this time I left the proud owner of a gorgeous new pen.

The next day we went to the Starbucks Reserve Roastery for brunch while waiting for Travelers Factory Nakameguro to open. This place rocked, and I don’t even drink coffee. The apple tart was the best I’ve ever had, and I’m from Vermont, we know our way around an apple. Do yourself a favor and check this place out. Travelers was cool, very cramped though, at one point I had to step outside to get some fresh air. But it’s absolutely worth going to, especially with the aforementioned food option nearby.

I had to be careful taking pictures in Travelers as they asked me not to photograph any of their customers without permission. Fortunately, all the folks hanging out in this upstairs cafe were American, so I had no problem getting their assent.

So you know how I mentioned I love the food in Japan? Here’s something that I think is worth going out of your way to get: shaved ice (natively kakigori).

You can find this delicious stuff all over in cafes and family restaurants, but we chose to go to a specialty place called Azuki to Kōri and let me tell you it was 100% worth the price. This massive dessert which we shared and could still barely finish was flavored with red shiso leaf, giving it a slightly lemony, slightly herbaceous tartness that perfectly offset the chocolate mousse that was both on top and forming a center layer. Nestled throughout were little cubes of plum jelly that were like little packets of sunshine peeking through the leaves of trees in autumn. A reservation is generally required here as there’s only about 8 seats, but they’re not hard to make through their own website (something becoming more common in Japan that was a welcome change from my first visit).

Our next day was spent hustling from building to building in Akihabara to avoid what was arguably the most aesthetically pleasing misty rain I have ever had the pleasure of getting soaked by. If you have never been to stores like Don Quixote (colloquially referred to as Donki), Yodobashi, or Bic Camera, I strongly urge you to go explore. They’re like if you stacked a Best Buy, Toys R Us, Michaels, Staples, a liquor store, and a drug store, all on top of each other, then made the top floor a food court in some cases just for good measure. It’s wild. But don’t sleep on them. The food is cheap and always very reliable and there’s stationery galore and sometimes the “basic” stuff (here basic meaning basic for Japanese stationery, so still really awesome,) is even more plentiful and cheaper than at the big name places like Itoya. We ended up actually buying a second suitcase here to carry all our purchases. It was much cheaper than the equivalent ones in the US and I highly recommend the option if you don’t already have the appropriate luggage options.

Do you like grilled meats/veggies on a stick? I’m not sure who wouldn’t. While the vegetarian selections at Shimonya (Akihabara) are somewhat limited, I can say that this hole-in-the-wall place is about as local as it gets around there, is cash only, and does require you to order a drink, but if that’s all no problem for you, then I can’t say enough about the mouth wateringly delicious yakitori we had there. If you’re relatively new to yakitori please trust me and try the ‘kawa’ (chicken skin). It’s salty, buttery, and a little crispy and this place really does it justice.

Back to stationery. The next day we visited Maruzen Marunouchi where I picked up some local edition Maruzen x Sailor inks. They also had a much larger selection of high-end fountain pens than the one in Ginza, which was surprising to me given it was a smaller store. What we didn't expect to find here was yet another hidden food gem. On the same floor as the stationery, was the M&C Cafe. Here you can not only sit in comfort and watch the trains arriving and departing from Tokyo station from the massive glass wall by your table, but you can also try the delicious Hayashi rice, a cross between a slightly sweet Japanese-style curry and omurice, a dish where a slightly undercooked omelet is placed deliciously on top of steaming hot rice.

This was a set meal and came with a salad, royal milk tea, and the aforementioned main dish of Hayashi rice, said to have been made by the founder of Maruzen himself, Hayashi Ariki.

Something about watching the trains silently come and go while the mist comes down outside and sipping tea really just ticks all the boxes for me. I could have sat here for hours. Sadly, we had places to go.

The next day was a big one, as we’d be going to Kakimori and I had pulled out all the stops. We were both signed up to take their Inkstand workroom course and we had a blast designing our own inks. It’s really hard to capture a color that you only have in your head, but I was aiming for something like a storm clouds green/blue/gray. Like right before a major storm breaks. I didn’t quite get it perfect, but I’m still very happy with the outcome. My partner went for more of a “kitten toebeans purple” as she described it and I think she nailed it.

The staff was fantastic. The reservations through their website did require me to reach out as there was some bug that wouldn’t allow me to proceed with the name I had entered, but a simple email was all it took to sort things out and I believe that it was most likely the result of me trying to make the reservation on a mobile browser.

While you’re there make sure to take advantage of the build your own notebook options they have. Just like a cafeteria you get a tray and can pick out everything from the paper, to the cover, to the color and style of the bindings and closures. They have some really amazing covers done by local artists, leather covers, pretty much the works. I made one for myself, and one for our benevolent overlord Brad. For both I chose a mix of Conqueror laid paper and Neue gray paper then matched the rings and ties to the covers.

This is mine, the cover is done by Teppei Soutoume. Brad’s (not pictured) is by Taku Bannai. There were “matching” back covers, but I chose to mix and match it up a little so chose a beautiful dark green leather for myself, and a gorgeous lime green for Brad’s.

But what would stationery be without the food to fuel it. And since you’re at Kakimori can I recommend the fantastic sushi restaurant, 豊鮨, which is conveniently is right nextdoor. For ¥1100 the lunch combo comes with 10 pieces of nigiri sushi, a roll, and miso soup. The beer was super cold, and the husband/wife duo who own the store were incredibly welcoming.

Cash only, as with many small shops, but worth being prepared for.

Oh and if you’re wondering how to tell what places are good in Japan, let me give you yet another hint. Tabelog is where the majority of locals review restaurants. I find the easiest thing to do is to look a place up on Google Maps, copy the name in Japanese, then paste it into the Japanese side of Tabelog, then let Google translate the resulting page for you. Note that scores on Tabelog are weighted so that a 5 is literally impossible to hit. Anything above a 3 is going to be great food. Anything above a 3.5 is going to be some of the best food you’ve had. Above a 4 is almost too fancy for me.

Our next couple days were almost entirely stationery-free. We went on a day trip to Yokohama (highly recommend) the walk around the waterfront is gorgeous, and there’s some amazing food there as well. Personal recommendation: Honmarutei Yokohama Motomachi. The shio ramen with dandelion greens and chashu had the perfect balance of salty, bitter, and fatty, which was somehow still incredibly refreshing despite the end of summer heat.

I got the bowl with extra chashu which was honestly too much! Look how thick cut those slices are. I’ve never seen slices that generous. I’m not a ramen die-hard, but the noodles were the perfect chewy and the broth was light and flavorful. Would recommend.

With the end of the trip in sight I’d just like to take a second on my soapbox to share two of my other favorite places to eat in Japan. First off is one you’ve likely heard about already: the convenience stores, referred to collectively as ‘conbini’. For me this means 7 Eleven, Family Mart, or Lawson. There are others, but these are the big 3. In each store you can find cheap, freshly made (delivered 3 times a day) meals, drinks, and basically any kind of snack you can imagine. The cost:quality ratio on conbini food is literally off the chart. Sure, you can get “better” food elsewhere, but when we’re talking ¥120 for a huge piece of delicious fried chicken or a freshly made tuna and mayo onigiri (rice ball) the value just literally can not be beaten.

Some guides will mention conbini, I want to emphasize it here, they are incredible. I go through literal withdrawal upon returning to the states without their quick, cheap, delicious options. One note: many conbini have a couple seats in the front to eat your food while you’re there. If you do decide to leave with your food, please do not eat and walk on the streets. It’s considered rude. And definitely do not eat while on the subway (but long-distance trains like the bullet train are ok). If you leave the conbini, also note that you’ll likely be carrying your garbage with you most of the day, as there’s very few public garbage cans in Japan. So if I can, I prefer to just eat at the conbini (or on a nearby ledge outside) so I can toss my trash right there.

Any meal can be a conbini meal. A new-to-me option this time around was the black tea baumkuchen, a type of pastry, at 7 Eleven. This made the perfect light breakfast with some tea on our way out the door.

The second place is way more controversial, but what’s a Sam article without a little bit of a hot take. I think CoCo Ichibanya (a Japanese curry chain) is actually GOATed. Yes, it’s not the highest quality food. But it’s literally better for the cost than even the fanciest katsu curry I’ve had in NYC. The fact that you can order on an iPad at your seat, in English, pay with card, the food is fast, delicious, oh man, yeah. You just gotta go in knowing it’s essentially the same as fast food, but like, orders of magnitude better. I know you can get higher quality curry from lots of places, but again, this is about comfort and ease of access as much as it is about how delicious the curry is.

My go-to order is the hand-made katsu curry with cheese, egg, and sausages. Yes, it’s a metric buttload of food. Yes, every bite is delicious.

In our last days of wandering we checked out the Mega Donki which, turns out, has some pretty sweet stationery including adorable Pokemon flakes! Seriously, don’t sleep on the department stores.

I hope you enjoyed this exuberant recap of my trip to Japan. If you have questions about traveling to Japan, the stationery I got, the food we ate, or really anything I missed, please drop a comment here or hit me up on Instagram and I’ll do my best to answer.