Pen: TWSBI Mini with 1.1mm stub nib

 

Another italic nib, but this one is a fair bit smoother, rounder and thinner. It writes much more reliably than the Lamy italic nib for casual note-taking. Technically it’s a stub rather than a crisp italic nib. The line variation is a lot less, but just enough to create a little flair.

The pen is made from polycarbonate, and I bought the clear one.

Ink: Diamine WES Imperial Blue

This ink is just amazing, but not always in a good way. It’s fairly viscous so it coats the inside of the pen as shown above. It’s almost purple, which makes it very eye-catching, and it hardly seems to shade at all, just lays down an intense blue-purple line with no colour gradient. Also, the bottle is my favourite shape of all the bottles I own; it’s just a shame they no longer supply the bakelite cap. The downside is that it’s a little hard on the eyes to read a whole page of it–but it looks nice in a letter anyway.

Paper: Basildon Bond

(Not a lot to say here: I’ve tried a couple of papers for letters and Basildon Bond is reliable and smooth, unlike some laid papers which don’t get on with this italic nib).