Thriftfinds Thursday - Inky goodness from across the border

On a recent impromptu trip to Antwerp for my wedding anniversary last weekend, we came across a few fun pen stores: Penworld, Kockx and Pen and Pencil. They are definitely worth the visit! I found a few vintage fountain pen ink gems I want to share with you here.

At Penworld I found the Caran d'Ache blue in a J. Herbin bottle. They are pre Colors of the earth series and I was lucky enough to find a turquoise bottle not too long ago at de Roos in Heemstede, NL. 

Also at the same store, in a little corner tucked away, I found these super cute mini baby bottles of sheaffer skrip inks. 

They are the size of those tiny baby bell cheeses, super cute! I do love cheese, but I rather have these inks than those baby bells though. Just saying in case you were wondering ;)

Then over at Kockx which is the oldest fountain pen store in Antwerp (and also has a lot of exclusive and expensive pens) I found the montblanc violet ink. I am very curious how this compares to the lavender purple. 

I can't wait to swab these on my Maruman Mnemosyne word card tabs. 

What is your latest lucky vintage find?

Thanks for stopping by!

namasté

Thriftfinds Thursdays: The Tilburg Penshow edition

My weekend activities were cut a bit short due to feeling under the weather, though I could not miss out on the yearly event that is the Tilburg penshow on saturday. It was the 27th pen show and it's been a bit obscure as it has practically no online presence, but the show was amazing none the less! Met some great pen people and an amazing seller whom has a nick-name of 'the one-man pen show' and I've found some sweet vintage fountain pen beauties there (they also sold a lot of newer fountain pens, but I go to these shows to find some older gems!) My wallet was hurting at the end of it, but it was a great day!

First an impression of the show:

The show was held at the Natuurmuseum in Tilburg. There were two rooms in which the vendors placed their goods for sale and I think there were about 30 vendors in total. We arrived right on time though, but still a lot of pens to look at during these 5 hours the show was open.

A new vendor to the show was Sarj Minhas and honestly there were so many good pens there it took a great portion of my time just staring at them!

La Couronne du Comte stand looked impeccable as always and they also have their own store front in Tilburg to which we went to after the show ended.

I did not have a list of things I wanted to buy and I figured I would know what I wanted when I see it. And boy I did see a lot of beauties, but I went home with 'only' 3 pens and 1 ink bottle (well technically two as I bought one later at Couronne du Comte...)

And these are the 3 pens:

My tilburg penshow spoils Omas Paragon with BB Mottishaw stubbed, Omas Extra Lucens with flexible Omas Extra Stub and Waterman England with 2A Flexible stub.

Writing samples are below:

I bought this pen at Sarj Minhas's stand for a really good deal! I love stubs and this is just a beauty of an Omas older paragon and fallen in love with it ever since I saw and wrote with Azizah's Omas Paragon which had a semi-flex nib. And steel blue is the ink I bought at Couronne later on. It's such a beautiful petrol color!

This is the Omas Extra Lucens from around 1937, which I got from Tom Westerich, a vaccuum power filler that needed a bit of silicone grease and TLC to work! This nib is such a gorgeous wet writer! Still needs a bit of work like heat setting the nib and feed properly because it has some start up issues, but wow, the Omas Extra nib just glides over the paper.

And this was a lucky grab on a 'needs repair/sold for parts' table. The only thing that needs work is the threads in the cap. But everything else just works great! There was even a sack in there so it was ready to write! And man, that stub nib is really stunning!

Last but not least, the unicorn find of the day:

Parker Penman Sapphire ink! And half full! For under 10€!! It was tucked away at a far corner of someone who sold a lot of older ink bottles and I couldn't believe my luck when I spotted it! I can't wait to test this in a pen!

We left for home satisfied and happy and I am already wondering what next year will be like at the penshow :) And I am curious: What was your greatest find at a pen show? 

Thanks for stopping by! 

namaste

Thriftfinds Thursday - Vintage Montblanc edition

During my holidays in Sweden I like to search the Loppis stores (thrift stores) and auktions (yard sales) for some fountain pen and craft related items. This year was a pretty well year for some cool finds. A few of them are from the brand Montblanc.

I found these lovely vintage Montblanc fountain pens at a loppis, the grey Monterosa and the black 342. Both of them have some wear and tear, the black body is marked up with scratches and the grey one lost the top and clip, but they still write really well. I revived the old ink that was in the pen to give them a test drive. The royal dark blue one still had some pretty good sheen to the ink!

The nibs, after some cleaning look good too.

In a store craft in Stockholm, I came across these montblanc ink bottles.

As you must know by now turquoise is my fave color, so I just had to snag these up. They are made in West Germany and the ink color and quality is still very good.

A comparison of the two older ink bottles, both turquoise ink. The bottom one I found at a local store in Amsterdam not too long ago. They were using it to dip test their pens in *shudders* so I am glad I saved it from the store from further abuse ;)

To provide you with some writing samples of both colors:

Ink from the bottom bottle a bit more saturated ink. 

Ink from the west germany bottle, a lighter turquoise. 

The first one looks a bit more saturated but it can also be the difference in how both pens write, nib width and such. But I do enjoy both these shades of turquoise :)

Hope you enjoyed seeing these vintage gems! 

Thanks for stopping by!

namaste

Thriftfinds Thursdays - Vintage Lamy fountain pens

Last weekend we had a visit to the ijhallen again. It's been a while since we've been there and it was fun to browse the stalls in the wonderful shunshine. Next to some fun clothing (you can score really fun clothes for a very cheap price) I actually found a few really cool and older Lamy fountain pens! even ones I have not seen before.

From left to right, Lamy Studio Pink (from West Germany), Lamy 27 Black with gold nib, Lamy Studio Musterd Yellow, Lamy Ratio with gold nib.

I am glad I invested in a sonic cleaner as these pens were really incrusted with ink. The gunk got cleaned right off the nibs! 

Close up of the older Lamy Studio:

You can see the inscription on the cap. It has a safari like cap and sectionand a brushed stainless steel body. Very interesting design. Another interesting fact; it takes international ink cartridges instead of propiatary Lamy ones. I have never seen these before and it's hard to find anything on the web about it... so if anyone has any info on these pens, please share :)

Thanks for stopping by!

Namaste

Thriftfinds Thursdays - The philatelist edition

In a little quaint town called Orvelte, they had a fun market around pentecost. And the towns people also sold some vintage stuff. I came accross a huge suitcase of glassine bags and upon further inspection, the glassine bags contained a lot of vintage stamps! I was in heaven! Took my fine time deciding which stamps I wanted to take home with me and kept it at a modest 10 bags.

I got home and started sorting them. It's always such a nice and relaxing task. I'm not a collector in the sence that I keep them in albums, I use them for my mail art mostly. So I got myself some glassine bags to store the stamps in.

Some of the mail art I make with postage stamps:

Are you a stamp collector? Do you use postage stamps in your art?

Thanks for stopping by!

Namaste

Thriftfinds Thursdays - Porte Plume

A little while ago I stumbled upon a great art and vintage market in Amsterdam at the Spui. Of course I can't walk by without checking out what they had for sale. And boy am I glad I did. A vendor was selling a lot of vintage adverts, stationery, papers and other paraphernalia and in a corner also a box with dip pens, pencils and yes... fountain pens. I scored the above beauties there for a really good price. And the fun thing was, he put them in an envelope of an old fountain pen store in Brussels as a wrapping. It has the 'Le Tirge' logo on it (which would make an awesome rubber stamp)! My little archivist heart just beated faster, so awesome to add this to my collection of fountain pen related goodies :)

The pen bodies do need some work to get them into full working order. The Crown one is the most intact one. Such a beautiful striated body! Of course I had to dip test them and the Crown and Onoto ones are really flexy. The duofold is a firm medium one. Sadly the caps of both the duofold and onoto are broken. But perhaps at the Tilburg penshow this year I might be able to find a replacement for them. 

Thanks for stopping by!

namaste

Thriftfinds Thursdays - Waterman Patrician Purple Ink

A few things I mostly look for at flea markets or thrift shops are fountain pens and ink. This Gem I found at a local market last summer. This old ink bottle is an vintage Waterman 'patrician purple' ink. I love the look of the bottle and the ink is still usable. It has a nice velvety lilac color.

The bottom of the bottle contains such nice details too. And you can see that the bottle is still quite full with ink! If you want to know more about the vintage ink range of waterman, I recommend you read this post by Toaster Pastry on Fountainpen Network. A very detailed and comprehensive review, worth the read. That tropic green is definitely one I will keep my eye out for!

Thanks for stopping by :)

namaste

Thriftfinds Thursdays - Minty Typewriter

Since I love to saunter on flea markets and stroll into thrift stores, I thought it would be fun to share some of my thrift finds and fun flea markets and vintage shops with you all. So introducing a new section called 'Thriftfinds Thursdays' as a nod to 'Throwback Thursdays' which is a popular 'thang' in the social media hangouts.

 One of my most awesome find a few years ago was this turquoise/mint typewriter which I got at a vintage stall at the Sunday Market in Amsterdam. I already owned two typewriters at that point but couldn't NOT have this one. A Brother Delux complete with instructions and in its original suitcase cover, it is a thing of beauty! After some cleaning and a new lint, it was ready to use. 

And yes in the mean time, I have used it a few times, to write letters with for the Typewritten letter swaps at Swap Bot hosted by Betsy Preston for instance. Also to write some text with to use on my mail art. It is not the most quiet typewriter out there, but since it is pretty, I can forgive it that ;)

Do you have a typewriter in your possession? If so, what brand and do you use it often?

Thanks for stopping by :)

Namaste.