The stylistic beauty of the tools, and the endless ink swamp｜ Graduate School of Media and Governance

I'm deeply into the fountain pen ink rabbit hole.

I have loved stationery since I was a child. If I find something interesting or cool in a shop, it's over. I end up taking it home with me. From small clips to rulers, notebooks and memo pads of all sizes, cute colored sticky notes, paper holders, and pens that exquisitely tickle my desire for ownership. The targets vary. Since I started earning a decent living, impulsive "adult splurging" has increased. Like buying every color of a new highlighter. I'm also weak for limited editions. In short, I'm playing right into the hands of stationery manufacturers.

And then, I dabbled in fountain pens. To put it bluntly, the trigger was becoming the Dean of the Graduate School. Given my position, I have more opportunities to be a signer. At first, I thought, "A ballpoint pen is fine," but as I watched my colleagues' smooth handwriting, my desire for things started to ache. Knowing my personality, I could easily imagine falling down the rabbit hole, so I held back for a while. For a while.

Birthdays are dangerous. Under the guise of a "reward for myself for working hard for a year"...

That said, my first step wasn't a high-end fountain pen, but a PARKER 5th. It's a slightly expensive felt-tip pen modeled after a fountain pen, boasting "fifth-generation pen" technology. I fell in love at first sight with its coolness—a matte black body with a purple grip section. I think it was at the writing instrument section of Maruzen in Nihonbashi. As someone who had long ago abandoned the habit of taking my hands off the keyboard to write, I was surprised by the fresh writing experience I had never felt before. The downside was that the ink ran out quickly and the cost-performance was mediocre.

Things moved fast from there. My longing for metal nibs grew day by day. After spending days browsing various web pages whenever I found time, the moment arrived. My luck ran out when I found a limited edition color of the CURIDAS retractable fountain pen—which I had vaguely thought was "nice"—at a certain mass retailer. Although it was a limited edition, it was just an ordinary steel nib pen that could be bought for a few thousand yen. Still, for me, it was my first one. The sensation of communicating with the paper through the scratchy feel of the letters was delightful. Before I knew it, more than ten pens were lined up in front of me.

Each piece isn't some expensive luxury item that would make senior collectors drool. 

They are all steel nib pens for everyday use, no different from what students carry. The only gold nib pens I have are two I bought because I fell in love with the limited colors (both Platinum Pen's #3776 Century). To begin with, the stationery industry has been seeing record price hikes due to the soaring price of gold and the weak yen over the past few years. It's common for store prices to suddenly double overnight. It's just not feasible. A clerk at my regular stationery counter even said, "Conversely, the limited editions left in stock are cheaper." I hope to own an AURORA someday, but for that, I'll need the preparation of a formal proposal and the courage to face a family meeting.

So, why did the number of pens increase this much?

The reason is simple. I fell for the ink even more than the fountain pens themselves. As my seniors say, "Well, that's how it goes." It's only natural to want to use a beautiful ink as soon as you get it. Consequently, the number of pens increases. In my case, the ink comes first now. The pens I bring home with them cost about 1,500 yen. Interestingly, even with the same product and the same line-width nib, the writing feel changes every time depending on the ink—sometimes scratchy, sometimes smooth, sometimes buttery. It's likely influenced by the viscosity of the ink and the ink flow of the pen body. Pilot's kakuno is fun because you can really feel those differences. It's probably the best value for money among steel nib pens. Of course, the feel also changes depending on the type of paper. The color payoff isn't the same either. The ink rabbit hole and the paper rabbit hole are like a set. The industry is clever; every stationery section has a well-stocked ink corner. An ink fair is being held somewhere every day. It's really not good. I'm barely holding myself back from dabbling in glass pens.

The relationship between fountain pens and ink is like hardware and software, cars and gasoline, or instruments and sheet music. I suppose I'm the type who gets excited not just by "beauty as a tool" but by the "stylistic beauty of tools."

For me, maintaining tools is also important time. When things get piled up, I wash the nibs. It's the same as sharpening a knife. It might sound exaggerated, but it allows me to clear my mind. I even make my own cleaning tools using used ink cartridges and syringes from 100-yen stores. Including making these little things, I like "doing" various things centered around tools. I sometimes talk with students about how "I like cameras more than I like photography." I wonder if the essence of this is the same.

I truly think to myself, "I really have an engineer's temperament."

P.S.

Regarding the "engineer's temperament," I have contributed a short piece to the

"Juku" column. Please feel free to read it when you have a moment.