Kaweco

Alsterhaus in Hamburg

A recent family trip to Hamburg [1]which was my first ever trip to Hamburg included a trip to Alsterhaus, a posh department store that very much reminded us of Harvey Nichols in Manchester.

Excuse the wide angle distortions of the photo but because of construction work I couldn’t move further away

The Alsterhaus sells many posh brands (think Armani, Chanel, Hermes, …), but unexpectedly we also found an extensive selection of stationery brands on one of the higher floors.

Some brands, like Graf von Faber-Castell, S. T. Dupont and Caran d’Ache take up large parts of the stationery corner’s luxury corner, but pens from other brands, like Pelikan and Kaweco, are also in stock.

Despite Alsterhaus’ general focus on luxury brands you can also find affordable stationery items for office and school use.

This includes a great selection of Lamy pens.

Faber-Castell, Leuchtturm and more were also available.

Thanks to my wife I walked away with Caran d’Ache’s Nespresso pencils (more about them at Pencil Talk) and my first ever “Les crayons de la maison” pencils (more about them at Lexikaliker, who discovered that this series is not quite what it is made out to be).

Prices were comparable to what you pay for these items in other shops or online.

This set seems to be the tenth edition, created together with Mizensir, a Swiss parfume firm.

When opening the plastic wrapping you can smell the strong smell from these pencils.

At this stage it is not completely clear whether the different pencils have different smells that are indistinguishable because they were together in sealed packaging or whether the different pencils have the same smell by design.

References

References
1 which was my first ever trip to Hamburg

Alsterhaus in Hamburg Read More »

All pencil and Kaweco

The 8008 All pencil

One of the indispensable pens in our kitchen is the Stabilo All pencil. It can write on almost any surface, so is suitable for labelling more or less whatever needs labelling in the kitchen: plastic tubs, bags, clips and more. When our current 8008 got lost we got a new one, or rather two: the graphite version (8008) and the colour pencil version (8046) which is not graphite based but more like a black coloured pencil.

One thing we noticed very soon is that, unlike our old version, the current version is now marked as being made in the Czech Republic. I assume it is made in Český Krumlov, Schwan-Stabilo’s factory that I mentioned in the past, the first time in a blog post about the EASYgraph.

Writing with the new version feels quite different. I hope the lost 8008 will turn up again so that I can compare them.

You can find a review of the 8008 on the From The Pen Cup Blog:

Kaweco

In other news: I noticed that Kaweco has a few new products, including the Perkeo in very unusual, matte looking pastel colours. Kaweco now also has ink bottles in a new square design and a new book. You can see the new products on Kaweco’s page for new products – I assume the page linked to will only show these products for a few weeks, so if you look at this blog post after Spring 2021 you probably won’t see them there.

The new Perkeo colours (Image © Kaweco)

There were also a few other, very nice products from Kaweco which don’t seem to be new, but which I haven’t noticed before – including a nice concrete pen holder. I couldn’t resist and ordered one, so will update you soon.


The Perkeo image has been taken from the Kaweco web site. I believe that the use of this images falls under “fair dealing” as described by the UK Copyright service.

All pencil and Kaweco Read More »

More student colours

After seeing Brad’s tweet about the new Kaweco Student colours, see below..

.. I couldn’t resist showing you my Kawecco Student 70s Soul again.

I have more fountain pens than I dare to admit and love EF nibs. The Soul has the smoothest and ‘finest’, in both senses of the word, EF nib of all my fountain pens.

PS: Nice naming scheme, Kaweco.

More student colours Read More »

The Kaweco Student 70’s Soul and its amazing EF nib

Since last Autumn I have used one fountain pen as my daily companion: The Kaweco Student 70’s Soul. A fountain pen with an amazing EF nib.

By coincidence it also fits quite well with my 2018 Hobonichi ‘hazelnut’ cover.

The Kaweco Student 70s Soul on a 2018 Hobonichi 'hazelnut' cover
The Kaweco Student 70s Soul on a 2018 Hobonichi ‘hazelnut’ cover

Below is a quick look at this fantastic fountain pen in the form of a video. I published it last November, so if you follow my YouTube channel you might have spotted this video before.

 

The Kaweco Student 70’s Soul and its amazing EF nib Read More »

The Kaweco Special 0.5 Push Pencil Black

The video for the Kaweco Special 0.5 Push Pencil Black has been added to my YouTube channel in April, so it’s high time to follow with the blog post for this nice mechanical pencil.

All the useful bits of information about this pencil can be found in the video itself, where I had a look at the 0.5mm version. There is also a 0.7 mm, a 0.9 mm and a 2 mm version.

I only cover the black aluminium version, but there is also a brass version.

While the body is made from aluminium, the front section seems tobe made from plastic. It does look pretty sturdy, though.

The pencil doesn’t come with the clip. If you like the clip you have to order it separately.
Compared to other mechanical pencils I reviewed recently the Kaweco Special has a larger diameter (so is furthest right in the chart below).

Compared to a selection of other mechanical pencils the Kaweco Special has the largest body diameter

There is no ‘dedicated grip section’, it’s just the front of the body, so this pencil is again leading the pack in terms of diameter.

Compared to a selection of other mechanical pencils the Kaweco Special has the largest grip diameter

The actual mechanism in the Special is from Japan and does contain plastic parts, but seems quite sturdy and should last many decades.

The Kaweco Special 0.5 Push Pencil Black Read More »