"Factory Green" is a Traveler's Company limited edition collection of some of their favorite brass writing instruments redesigned with a light teal green brassing coating. This series was inspired by a shade of green paint that is commonly used in manufacturing plants, on industrial printing presses and along the floors, doors and shelves in many factories in Japan. One example in particular comes from a well-used shelf in the Traveler's affiliated Designphil Nagareyama Plant that has been used to store a large number of printing ink cans; over the years, the paint has faded, chipped and stained in certain spots and just...

Over the weekend we prepared many of these fun packages for Google NY. It’s part of a program they are doing to keep their employees engaged while staying at home and we love how they are finding ways to support local businesses like us. We are happy to see that people are excited about letter writing and that we can help encourage this activity that we love very much.  Many of you have been asking us to share what products we've included in these letter writing kits so we thought we might share with you a list of what put inside: ...

Happy Memorial Weekend everyone! We went out for a short walk yesterday in our neighborhood. Next to the park, a few blocks are dedicated for pedestrians. Since quarantine, other than stopping by the shop in the morning, most of the time we stay in door. It’s nice to be out and even though it was a normal walk, it turned out to be very memorable during this time. Hope everyone is having a relaxing weekend too!

Starting Monday with pretty colors : ) These are Pentel Touch Brush Sign in Nuance Color series. The pen has a flexible felt tip that allows a variety of controllable line width. The tip is slightly stiff but so elastic that it takes much less time to get used to. They are perfect for beginners who'd like to start practicing brush calligraphy and we actually use them for our calligraphy workshops. These 12 colors will be regular colors in addition to the original 12 colors 🌈

Started in 1925, Shachihata has been a leading brand in name stamps and ink pads in Japan. Name stamp is an essential part of life in Asia, and everyone has at least one to seal official documents. When Neil opened his first bank account in Taiwan, a name stamp was required and any important changes would require the original stamp to be presented. It’s like an additional ID. It’s common to stamp next to your signature when you sign a document to indicate it’s a serious verification. Sometimes, on less official documents, stamping by itself just means that you have...

Our favorite Hobby Stationery Box magazines just arrived 🙌The March volume 53 is on the left and special fountain pen ink edition is on the right. In the special edition, the magazine selects over 2000 colors that it has featured over the years since it's first issue in 2004. In 2004, there were only 230 ink colors featured in the magazine, and sixteen years later, the magazine has cataloged over 2000 colors and has tried it's best to represent the color as true as possible. Every color is swatched in this edition and the first page features a comprehensive chart...

This week we are very excited to start featuring Platinum — one of the big three Japanese fountain pen brands among Pilot and Sailor. We are clearly having way more Sailor currently 😂 but it’s a milestone for us to be able to cover the popular pens from all three brands. In the photo are Platinum Century 3776, Sailor 1911 Standard and Pilot Custom 74 🖊

Platinum is another brand that we’ve always wanted to add to our collection. This week, we are slowly adding a few of Platinum’s iconic pens. Here’s the first one — Preppy. Since its launch in 2007, Platinum's Preppy fountain pen has become one of the most popular entry level fountain pens available today with 10 million pens sold worldwide! It's easy to see why this is a popular choice as a first fountain pen for so many. With its approachable, friendly and colorful design, and Platinum's own "Slip and Seal Mechanism" that employs a spring in the cap to force...

Happy May! But where did April go? Is anyone else feeling like that? Despite how it feels, looking back now, we realize we’ve actually done a lot and added a lot of new stationery this month! And together with Soraya @sorayadesignsthings , we have been working on improving our website, making things more easily searchable, re-writing descriptions and re-taking old photos. It’s a slow and steady process but we are chugging along! With all this time at home, we have also been exchanging some letters with friends, finding new ways to keep in touch with loved ones, giving ourselves something to look...

Pilot Multi Ball is a special pen that has been around for a while. The current version is a redesign released about 10 years ago, and it’s a modest looking pen with great applications. The pen is water-based pigment ink. It writes smooth, the body has a rubber grip, and it looks just a regular gel pen. However, the pen comes with a special ink, “M Ink”, which allows it to stay on smooth surfaces such as metal, glass and plastic. For our shop, we like to use it on washi tape. Many gel pens don’t write well on washi...