To finish off this series I’d like to share some miscellaneous advice about fountain pens.

Be Careful with Luxury Brands

Pretty much all fountain pens could be considered “luxury” these days. However, specifically be careful with brands that market themselves as luxury. Montblanc is a great example of this. In the last 30-40 years the quality of their fountain pens has declined as they focus on other parts of their business, but they still charge a premium. Vintage Montblanc pens are higher quality and can be had for much cheaper than new.

Visconti is another example. I haven’t personally used one, but they are known for having frequent issues with their nibs (up to the point of not writing at all) and poor customer service.

The fundamental problem here is that you’re paying for the name on the pen and for it to be attention-catching in your hand or on your desk. It doesn’t matter if the writing experience is poor if it’s only used for an occasional signature. If you want to write with your pens, on the other hand, you’ll be unhappy with such a pen.

Interestingly I have not found this to be the case with the Japanese luxury brands Namiki and Nakaya. You are still paying for the name to some extent, but the craftsmanship is better and the pens write well.

Explore Beyond the Common

I got a lot of my initial advice about fountain pens from the r/fountainpens subreddit. It’s a fantastic community and very helpful, but like all such communities it has developed some preferences. Commonly recommended brands get upvoted, which makes new members inclined to purchase the same things, and it snowballs from there. In general the advice is good, particularly for those just starting out.

However, several of my favorite pens are only rarely discussed there, and I found them by chance. The Waterman Carène I saw mentioned when looking at a discussion of vintage Waterman pens. I had never even heard of the Waldmann brand until receiving a Solon in Truphae’s subscription box. I’ve had both of these pens inked since first receiving them. These aren’t rare in the way an uncommon vintage model are; they’re still mass-produced modern pens. But it is unlikely I would have even considered these if I stuck with the standard recommendations.

On the flip side I’ve disliked some of the most popular pens on that subreddit. In particular I’m not a fan of the way the Lamy 2000 writes.

This isn’t to say that you should ignore popular recommendations, they are usually popular for a reason. But once you’ve established your own preferences more, be open to exploring additional options.