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I have Sailor 1911 L Sailor Compass aka Profit Junior Platinum 3776 Century Platinum President Pilot 74 Pilot 78g Muji pen

Beautiful pen, and it writes okay. I will confess that I much prefer how John Mottishaw ground cursive italic nibs to the way the new nibs dot com owners are doing them. David

I have ordered the Dorsal Fin Version 2 and I am anticipating its arrival. I was looking around for a used Decapod to by by-pass that long wait times, if possible. Please let me know if you have or or know of one for sale. Thank you for your help!

I have been thinking about acquiring a Nakaya in the Araishu (orangish) urushi lacquer for some time. Nibs dot com finally had one in stock when my resistance was low. I ordered it with a BB nib ground to crisp cursive italic. The color is a brownish-orange, which I like a lot more than I would a brighter orange. The aesthetics exceed my expectations. Here are some photos of the new pen, including side-by-side comparisons of the araishu, unpolished shu and shu urushi finishes. Orange you glad I shared this? Happy writing! David

Pen Pit Stop : Nakaya Briarwood Deep Matte Welcome to the Pen Pit Stop. Here you will find reviews of pens that already have some mileage on them. More specifically, these reviews are of pens that are in my personal collection, and that have been in use for at least a year. I thought it would be fun to do it this way – no new & shiny pens here, but battered vehicles that have been put to work for at least a year. Let’s find out how they have withstood the ravages of time. The fountain pen that arrives at the pit stop today is the “Nakaya Briarwood Deep Matte”. Nakaya is best known for their exclusive urushi and maki-e fountain pens, which usually come with a corresponding hefty price-tag. But Nakaya also produces a couple of entry-level wood-based pens, produced with similar craftsmanship and eye for detail, with the same cigar-shape, and with a more palatable price. A couple of years ago there was a mix-up with one of my orders at LCDC. Everything was sorted out without a problem, but LCDC was nice enough to offer me an extra discount to compensate me for the inconvenience. This brought the Nakaya within reach, and somewhere in autumn of 2018, I ordered this nice Briarwood pen. With Nakaya, you sometimes have to wait a long time for your pen to be made – in my case, the pen was delivered in July 2019, making a nice birthday present. Nakaya’s eye for detail and quality already starts with the packaging. My pen arrived in a nice wooden box, and was wrapped in a small one-pen kimono case. These guys know how to present their product! Pen Look & Feel The Briarwood is an entry-level Nakaya pen. My pen is the Deep Matte version, which is well-machined, but not polished to a high shine. If you like shiny pens, there also exists a Deep Gloss version. For wooden pens, my personal preference goes to the matte version… it just fits better with the character of the pen. The Briarwood Deep is a pen with a dark-brown wood grain, which looks really beautiful, and which has a warm feel to it. Understated gold trimmings and clip complete this elegant pen. The cap’s ring band shows the pen’s only branding: “Japan Nakaya Fountain Pen”. Elegant simplicity is a good way to capture this pen's look and feel. The Briarwood pen comes with an entry level mono-tone 14K gold nib. Although entry-level, the nib looks really nice with sharp engravings and a lovely heart-shaped breather hole. Mine came with an M-nib that writes comparable to a European fine. The nib wrote smoothly right out of the box. It has a little bit of feedback, just enough to let you know there is contact with the paper. Even reverse writing works without a problem – you just get an even finer line, like a western EF. And this pen works really well for longer writing sessions. The black plastic grip section is big enough for a comfortable grip, and tapers out slightly towards the nib (ensuring that your fingers remain firmly in place). The Nakaya Briarwood is a cartridge converter pen, that adopts the proprietary Platinum fitting. The pen came with a converter included (always a nice touch). Nakaya even added a little adapter that lets you use standard international cartridges. Japanese pen makers have mastered the art of elegant simplicity. This Nakaya Briarwood pen is an excellent example: a very high quality pen with a minimalistic design – a wonderful writing instrument! The pictures above illustrate the size of the Nakaya Briarwood Deep in comparison with a standard Lamy Safari. The pen is comparable in size to the Lamy – a reasonable but not too unwieldy size, suitable for longer writing sessions. The Nakaya also has some weight to it, due to the wood being heavier than plastic. By no means a heavy pen, but also not a featherweight. You can post the pen, but I would not recommend it: 1/ the pen is big enough as it is, and 2/ the metal band on the cap might lead to scratches on the wooden barrel. Pen Characteristics Build Quality : build quality is truly excellent. The quality of the craftsmanship is very present. All aspects of the pen are made with an eye for detail. After two years of regular use, the pen looks good as new. Weight & Dimensions : about 125 mm when uncapped, which is how I use it to write with. A bit smaller than an uncapped Lamy Safari. The pen weighs about 30 grams, not heavy but also not a featherweight. Weight & dimension are just right to make this an ideal pen for longer writing sessions. Filling System : this is a cartridge converter pen, which uses a Platinum style fitting. A high-quality converter (glass & metal) was included with the package. Nakaya also provided an adapter piece that allows you to use standard international cartridges. Nib & Performance : the monotone 14K-585 gold nib fits the minimalistic design of the pen very well. Despite its simplicity it is a well-engineered nib, that wrote flawlessly right out of the box. My only complaint is that the pen has no exchangeable nib unit (like on a Pelikan). Being able to change nibs is a significant plus in my book, but is not supported on this pen. Price : I got this pen for about 400 EUR, including taxes. Not a cheap pen, but the quality you get is certainly worth the price.  Conclusion My Nakaya Briarwood Deep Matte is a beautify wooden writer, that perfectly embodies the Japanese principle of elegant simplicity. A lovely pen with a flawless nib – made for long writing sessions. One of the favourites in my pen collection. I am really glad that I bought it.

Hello All, A Nakaya I ordered a while back is about to be ready! Two of my favorite nibs are the King of Pen(M) and the Custom Urushi #30(FM). Does anyone have advice on a Nakaya nib that would be close to these? I know that on average Nakaya nibs are drier/stiffer, but would the soft/elastic modifications give a little bit of bounce? I don't care for line variation, my handwriting doesn't really allow for it, but I do like a bit of a bouncy feel. I would also like it to be decently wet. Would an elastic broad be something reasonable? I'm ordering directly from Japan. I read many various threads on this forum regarding nib advice, and I couldn't find something that matched my questions, so I thought I'd make a new post. Sorry for the spam! Cheers.

I ordered this pen at a very difficult time. My darling best friend, Sufi – a mongrel my wife rescued from a building site at the turn of the millennium – was dying of a long, debilitating illness. On the eve of what would prove to be her last stay in veterinary hospital, I decided that, already wounded and seething, I would need something to remember her by when the inevitable happened. I’ve previously ordered both from Nakaya directly and from Classic Fountain Pens (CFP) and considering past experience, decided once more to approach John and his troupe in California. Dealing with Nakaya is not necessarily an unpleasant experience, but the culture and language barrier, combined with the inevitable google translate, can cause ambiguity in communication where – for this project especially – I required absolute clarity. CFP did not disappoint: a few days of email to-and-fro-ing led to a series of pictures being sent, and the conclusion of a design aesthetic: “Sufi and Chloe chasing away a crow”, both a poignant (to me) symbol of the immutability of memory, and a literal representation of one of their favorite pass-times. A maximum budget was also proposed (be clear: in the world of custom works, the maximum budget is the final cost). The brief was passed to Nakaya, and a few weeks later a sketch was delivered. It was perfect bar the order of the dogs (Sufi always took the lead; Chloe followed) – a minute on photoshop and the design was approved. By this point, Sufi was gone; euthanised as I held her (so thin, so broken) in my arms, buried in a shady spot beneath a tree. And so the wait began, and with it the process of acceptance that feels so much like forgetting. Almost a year after the process began, I got an email to say the pen had arrived, and within a week, I was opening the box in Tel-Aviv. There is a moment of recalibration with every custom pen that comes the first time the finished article is unpacked and held, the details taken in. Unlike pens mass-produced on a conveyor belt, the end result is a complete unknown. Things that are usually taken for granted (tactility, finish, texture) are question-marks, and over the course of deciding, of tweaking, of ordering, a platonic ideal builds and grows and exists in the commissioner’s mind – the pen that is expected, the pen that is desired. Then, when the actual real physical object is something different – less, or more; different – the break occurs and the new, real relationship begins. With most pens, this reappraisal process is purely physical; here, the primary disappointment was emotional. I unpacked the pen, felt its weight, the perfectly smooth black urushi, the delicately layered maki-e – silver and gold for Sufi, silver for Chloe – the stark simplicity of the design echoing the unadorned curves of the shape . And then I repacked it and put it away. I think I cried a bit too. Sufi I had been giddy with excitement, for somehow, foolishly, I must have believed that having a pen in her likeness would bring Sufi back. But a pen is a pen and my best friend is dead; I was a fool to think otherwise. Chloe A few weeks later, I was able to start again. I was able to appreciate the fine detail of the artist, the flawlessness of the work, the eerie perfect luster of the black urushi gloss. I noticed too the shape of the paw-adorned section (slightly more grooved than the one on decapod, and slightly less comfortable for it), and how the usual irritation of the four-thread cap not lining up was not an issue in this design. I felt how the rhodium plating turned the usually soft and supple 14k gold Platinum nib into a Sailor 21k mimicking nail, and decided the the XF nib was too fine and scratchy for me, even after John Mottishaw’s fettling (it would soon be replaced by a similarly rigid rhodium F). Slowly but surely, I began to use it. First it found its way into my tertiary Sage Brown case and then into my secondary. Now, finally, after six months I feel it has been sufficiently decontaminated of that initial flush of emotional impotence, to the point where it is what it should always have been (and all it could ever have been): a beautiful momento of a passed time and a missed friend; one that happens to also be an exceptionally good pen. Thank you for reading. Following requests, I have conducted a separate comparative review of Nakaya, Romillo and Hakase in order to provide an overview of the daunting task of commissioning a custom pen. If you are interested, it can be found here.

For the longest time, I counted myself firmly as an adept of Aka-Tamenuri, red being the essence of old urushi art in Japan. I wrinkled up my nose in distaste of other gimmicky color combinations. “Midori-Tamenuri. Why not adding a Maki-e Pokemon then?” And that was when the depths of my folly were revealed to me, as I had for the first time a Shiro-Tamenuri pen before my eyes. A friend’s pen. Today, I received a lovely box from Nakaya, containing my first Shiro-Tamenuri pen. My lousy photos do not do it justice. The top coating alternates: a chocolatey brown indoors, a sunset orange when in direct sunlight. A deep golden sea lies in its depths, emerging to the surface in the urushi fins. The nine-tailed fox glistens and hides, revealing itself only in parts. An elusive ember warms my finger as I write.

(exhaling) OK ladies and gentleman. Right now I am compiling a list of my grail pens particularly from Japan and would really appreciate your input. I don't know how I got into this mindset but I really am researching seriously in determining a grail pen and it is between the four brands/pen type mentioned in the thread title. My plan is that IF sometimes in the future I visit Japan, I will be doing some pen hunting and pull the trigger on my grail pen (adjusting to future conditions of course). The price limit will be at max around $1100 so it will narrow down some of the model in the brands line up. I really wanted to include Namiki (Emperor) but $2000 is just too much of a stretch for me. I believe that most of them are similar in size (the Izumo being smallest out of the bunch) so I would not count them as a deciding factor. All are Urushi lacquered except the KoP at the price range although it is not a deciding factor for me. If you could provide the pros and cons of your preferred pens compared to the others in the list, please do share and thanks a lot!

Dear all, I have 2 Nakaya's, clipless versions Cigar Aka Tamenuri and Piccolo long in Kuro Tamenuri. Both comes from the dealers and now I thinking to personalize them- put my signature in Kanji. This option in Nakaya company available for new orders, but I afraid that it will be too difficult and pricy to send them old Nakaya with inquiry only for maki-e sighature.. May be there are other independent artists who can make (draw) signature in this technique on my Nakayas? Thank you in advance for suggestions! Giedrius

After taking a look at various Japanese works of art decorated in Urushi lacquer, I notice that many objects are often coated in a bold and contrasting, yet harmonious, mix of red and black lacquer. Here are some examples: Therefore, it's quite surprising to me that Nakaya doesn't offer this classic color scheme for its standard line of pens. Although they do have finishes like Kuro Tamenuri, the contrast is not as striking as those depicted in the objects above. The closest thing is the Jidai Nuri finish; however, this rougher and less shiny finish, while very beautiful in its own right, may not suit everyone's aesthetics. Therefore, I've done some amateur photoshopping to create a Nakaya that I think should be part of the company's permanent collection. Here's my proposed design: What do you think? Would you buy this pen if Nakaya were to offer it as part of its permanent collection? My wish is that a lot of of fountain pen users would find this design attractive enough to persuade Nakaya to offer it as part of its standard product line.

A slightly different review of Nakaya Decapod TW in kuro-tamenuri. Why are my reviews different? I focus on urushi aspect. On technique used, quality of finish, care tips, longevity etc. Watch the video, and please click the LIKE button - it helps me with Youtube algorithms, and to reach more interested people. Subscribe to my channel if you want more

I got my Nakaya Piccolo Cigar in Aka-tamenuri Monday from Nibs.com and am really loving it. I'm happy I got it before they had to close business from the COVID-19 shelter-in-place order in California. In any case the pen came in the standard wood box you normally see from Nakaya with all of the same stuff. The other pen I got was Friday a Platinum Izumo in Soratame green. Both pens a B nibs. The president nib on the Platinum is wetter and puts down a slightly thicker line of the two. I got the Izumo from Cult pens and was a bargain compared to getting it from the states. I'm very happy to have bought both pens and they are both nice in my hand to write with. It does have me wanting more though! Now I want a Nakaya Piccolo Writer in Heki-tamenuri, and maybe a Nakaya Naka-Ai. I'm tempted but a Namiki Emperor #50, but balking at the size, but that section looks so comfortable. I don't think there is anything else that feels like Urushi over ebonite. Not sure I can stop at just two, but see having 50-100 like some of you guys I'm currently at 81 pens as it is. http://www.jeffdellis.com/images/Nakaya-1.png http://www.jeffdellis.com/images/Nakaya-2.png And for people that don't know the size of the Nakaya here it is with a Lamy Safari http://www.jeffdellis.com/images/Nakaya-3.png For the eagle eyed... yes the Izumo has a small chip next to the clip. I fumbled it a day after getting it and dropped it on to my desk where it then bounced and hit a metal water bottle on the floor leaving the chip but no other damage. It doesn't affect anything and normally isn't noticeable.

Dear forum members, I would like to introduce my new book to you. It shows in word and picture over 550 pens, all in connection to the animal kingdom. You will find pens from 80 companies. The book weighs over 1.5 kilo, has more than 200 pages. The attached pages show how the book is structured. Described is also a number of pens that are not shown. Also 100 pens that were sold by well-known auction houses. The book price is USD 150; (euro 124) including shipping. Many thanks for your interest. We do accept paypal (regina.martini@t-online.de). best regards Regina Martini

It's that time of year again when I get itchy for a new pen! After browsing through brands and models I've tentatively settled on getting an Architect's Point nib from one of the pretty urushi Nakaya pens. Now the question is, which nib should I choose to start the grind off from? Medium, Broad, or Extra Broad? Some background: I love big contrasts in line variation, so anything that heightens that would be awesome. I heard that Bs and BBs produce wider line variations than the M when ground into Architect's Point--is this true? What's the widest width capable from an AP ground from a B/BB nib versus M nib? I'm also concerned about the low ink capacity of Nakaya cartridge convertors (0.5ml of ink!), so I don't want something that writes so broad that it eats up all my ink within a few writing sessions. Thanks in advance for your help, Nakaya writers!

In the past I I read with interest write-ups about one's collection. I thought to share mine as I am reflecting on the hobby. I have been heavily invested into fountain pens since 2005. Do not ask me why. I just got the bug. Initially focused on collecting, then in more recent years trying to find the perfect writers. I think I can now narrow down my inseparable fountain pens into the following 15. Let me share with you what makes them special to me. I will start from the left: 1. Visconti Ripple in Blue Silver (BB Palladium nib): this is a classic early model from Visconti (not to be confused with the equally appealing Watermark) with a silver overlay that is colored in blue with a technique used in the auto-industry. At that time, it was quite a feat. One of Del Vecchio's creations. The added bonus is the double broad palladium nib, smooth and stubbish. It is an heavy pen but I do not mind. Provenance: Peytonstreet Pens (2018). 2. Visconti Ripple Carbon Fiber (M Palladium nib). This was a collaboration between Visconti and an Italian company specializing in carbon fiber for sport cars (Carbon Dream, the logo of Carbon Dream appears on the cap finial). The nib has a very good flow and it is a pleasure to write with. Provenance: private seller in China. 3. Visconti Opera Master Demo (18K F Nib). This is another classic model, quite heavy, and the surprise was the nib. I do not usually like fine nibs but this is really wet and leaves a satisfying line on the paper. Provenance: Eurobox in Tokyo. 4. Visconti Homo Sapiens London Fog (M Palladium nib). It is one of the most balanced models in terms of lenght and weight. Born to write. The gray swirls to me are very attractive aesthetically. The nib has a very good flow (almost a and comes with a hint of feedback that is not bad. Provenance: private seller from Spain. 5. Visconti Homo Sapiens Jade (14k B nib modified). This might look like a boring repetition of the previous model, but it comes with a nib with a story. It is an old 14k nib, super smooth, that was modified by Nagahara Jr, a famous nibmeister previously working for Sailor, with his signature cut that provides line variation according to the angle you hold the pen. Perhaps just a gimmick if you do not write in Chinese or Japanese, but the nib is even smoother than before. Provenance: Martini Pens in Germany. 6. Pilot Custom Urushi Vermillion (B 18k nib). I remember how this model was talked about back in 2015 in stores in Tokyo before its release. It was much anticipated. A new model from Pilot does not happen every day. It turned out to be an oversize version of Pilot's previous flagship, the 845 Urushi, with a spectacular new nib, a number 30 nib (smaller than the Emperor's nib, but larger than the nib on the Yukary's pens). The nib is very bouncy, leading to flex (which I am not interested) and I love the generous flow. Provenance: Morita Pens in Osaka (2017). 7. Delta Dolcevita Piston Filler Maraviglia (BB 14k nib). I generally like Dolcevita pens from now-defunct Delta. But this is phenomenal because of the combination of a very attractive material (a turquoise celluloid) and the stubbish smooth BB nib. Provenance: ebay auction (from a former member of this board). 8. Sailor King of Pen Urushi Vermillion (B 21k Nib). I find the minimalist style and the size of this pen very attractive. One special feature: it never dries! I left the pen inked and untouched for months and would always write even after a long period of non-use. Super smooth nib. Provenance: Aesthetics Bay, Singapore (2016). 9. Nakaya Neo Standard Arai-shu (M 14k nib, reground). I have several Nakayas, but this is my favorite because of the nib. It came with a cursive italics nib that I hated (too crisp). A nibmeister during an event in Japan was able to smooth it and now is a beautiful medium stub, with very distinct line variation. Only downside, a lot of turns to open or close. Provenance: private seller on FPN market. 10. Hakase green celluloid and white buffalo horn (18k "stub" nib). Hakase is an artisan company in Tottori. The current maker is the third generation and basically he runs one-man operation. I first read about Hakase in this forum and I was left fascinated. Then one day actually I included Tottori in an itinerary in Japan and I ordered my first one (the next pen). This is my last Hakase, ordered during an event in Tokyo back in March 2018. Ryo Yamamoto, the current maker, is a very able nibmeister. All nibs were adjusted to my writing posture and they are all incredibly smooth. The writing experience with these nibs is very pleasant. 11. Hakase green celluloid (18k B nib). This is the model I ordered during my first encounter with Ryo in his shop in Tottori in 2015 (and delivered in Tokyo one year later). Magnificent smooth nib. I probably exaggerated by adding the possibility to post an already quite long pen. It can work as a desk pen. 12. Hakase in black buffalo horn (18k M nib). This is a very sleek and balanced model. The nib is M with a hint of stub, another extraordinarily unique nib. I ordered it in Tokyo in 2016 during the meeting to take delivery of the first pen and got it again in Tokyo in March 2017. 13. Omas Paragon gray celluloid 90th anniversary (18k BBB nib). I have been a big Omas fan and collector. For many years Omas pens were the only ones I ever used. Now I have only one in this definitive list, but there might have been more. The gray celluloid has some incredible depths and the faceted Paragon is just a timeless elegant design, according to my taste. The nib is an incredible stub, but very smooth. Provenance: trade with a collector in Taiwan (2018). 14. Pelikan M1000 with aftermarket raden decoration (18k F nib). This is my first Pelikan and it immediately made it to the list. The first reason is about aesthetics: the raden work is so clever. The raden was cut to resemble small nibs and they are perfectly arranged on the body and the cap. I immediately liked the creativity of this decoration. The raden work was made by Mr Iwase, a Japanese maker that is quite famous nowadays for these modifications. The second reason is that the F nib actually writes like an M with a very generous flow and meets my requirements. Provenance: Mr Iwase from a pen show (2019). 15. Newton Shinobi (with Omas 18k BB nib). This was a custom pen commissioned to Newton using one of his most popular models. My goal was to re-create a pen with an Omas vibe (hence the semi-transparent celluloid) and to host a terrific double broad Omas nib. The pen had some problems. I had to send it to a repairer that fixed it. Notwithstanding the ordeal, it still makes it to the list because of the nib (that I may transfer to a regular Omas pen in the future). Now, reflecting on the hobby, I think that I reached my level of satisfaction. It is more and more difficult to fall for a new pen, especially with a large collection of pens that do not get any use sitting on the side. I do not regret anything about my journey because apart from the occasional adrenaline rush, thanks to this hobby I made friends and I learnt about cultures and crafts.

The Nakaya Pen Event 2019 at Sakura Fountain Pen was an absolute success! Close to 100 fountain pen aficionados visited the Sakura Fountain Pen Gallery to see Nakaya’s lead designer and nib meister Yoshida-San at work. The online pen community from the BeNeLux and far beyond was well-represented, and our store quickly turned into a cozy and fun meeting of like-minded souls that all speak the same language: nibs, nib-meistering, urushi, inkflow, lettering, Tomoe River, … Full of wonder and respectfully, we gazed at Yoshida-San swift and accurately tuning a nib or creating a crisp stub with extra ink flow. Check out the full epilogue : https://www.sakurafountainpengallery.com/en/blog/detail/nayaka-event-2019-epilogue

My Nakaya Long Cigar Aka-tamenuri is singing. I thought its another case of a singing nib so I polished it. Its still singing. But what I noticed its not the nib. Its the barrel. If I just write with nib and section the singing is gone. Same is true if I write holding the pen higher up on the barrel. It seems that long hard rubber barrel is amplifying the vibrations from the nib making high pitched noise I find annoying. Never heard of this before. Any ideas how to get rid of this?

So I was planning to buy a nakaya medium nib, then I saw this review https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQSfX91oAC4 by Mr. Brown. As you can see in the video the regular medium seems very dry and hard as a nail. Then I saw the soft medium, it seems like it is the nib I really want. A little bit flexible and pretty wet. But still I can't be so sure just from watching a video. So I'd like to ask anyone that has experienced it firsthand how the soft medium feel compared to the regular medium nakaya nib (is the medium really that dry? because I'm a little bit shocked at how dry and hard it is). My favorite kind of spring is the m200 fine steel nib. It is springy but not to springy. I don't like a nib that is too springy like the soft fine 14K platinum nib. Please share your experience on the nakaya soft medium and medium nib! It'd be much better if there is a comparison of those nakaya nibs to pelikan m200 fine nib and platinum soft fine nib. Thanks in advance! Edited: seems like I provided a wrong link to an anime video, I've corrected the youtube link

I am right now in the market for a Nakaya pen. Specifically the portable writer and I want to get some more information about the finish of the pen before I feel comfortable buying it. The main question I have is really about how the finish looks in person compared to some photos I've seen of it. In some photos it looks really wonderful and black with bright red accents. However sometimes it looks like more of a reddish brown throughout. I was wondering what exactly everyone thought about this finish and how it looks. Pictures would really be helpful. The second thing I want to know is how exactly this ages over time. It says the Kuro Tamenuri finish changes and becomes more colorful over time where the black is worn away and the red becomes more prominent. How much does it change exactly and is it going to wear more where my hands touch? Will I get a strange finger shaped red circles on the grip where I touch it? Again thanks for any and all information!

Remember when Travolta opened the briefcase in Pulp Fiction? Now I know what was inside! As is my preference I ordered this Nakaya directly from Japan via email. They are always most pleasant and the nib adjustment beyond reproach. I’ve collected fountain pens for nearly 25 years and this is far from my first urushi fountain pen. It’s not even my first chinkin pen. Nevertheless, I am astonished by this amazing pen. The combination of beauty, bespoke craftsmanship, and writing qualities are unmatched in my collection. The finish is darker, more subdued, radiant, gorgeous, brighter, and bewitching than I imagined. Confused? It depends on the ambient light, but this pen quietly screams sublimity. The size, shape, balance, geometry, design, and execution render a pen that simply functions as a superb writing instrument. The medium nib writes what appears to be a boringly unwavering (Japanese) medium line. What you cannot observe is the experience that is one of supreme confidence and superlative feel. It puts down exactly the amount of ink required smoothly without fuss at the exact angle I hold the pen. It’s…natural. The packaging is standard Nakaya and the one “upgrade” I got was the urushi koi painted converter, which is very cute. The pen shipped with a cartridge in place all ready to write; a bit of a surprise but a pretty confident move. This pen was made for writing. A hand-made piece of high-end art with a purpose. Here it is compared to the Sailor KOP vermilion urushi. The KOP costs almost double...

I'm planning to purchase a nakaya pen, probably neo standard. I'm wondering if the pen kimono is included or purchased separately?

I am thinking about getting a Nakaya Decapod or a Taccia Kaku-Tate, but I am not sure how they compare to each other: Does anyone have a picture with both of them, maybe even together with another pen like a Lamy 2000 or Safari? As far as I can tell, the Nakaya Decapod is significantly smaller and a bit slimmer, since it is also slightly tapered towards the ends. But does the Taccia Kaku-Tate really look "bulky" in comparison? Thanks a lot in advance!

Time to organise a trip to Belgium : SAVE THIS DATE, we hope to welcome a lot of pen enthousiasts !

Time to organise a trip to Belgium ! All welcome at our Nakaya event ! Sincerely, Catherine