Are duplicates a problem? This is one of the commonest falacies that I come across very regularly and it’s actually not a problem at all…
One of the great joys of owning a fountain pen is the ability to use a vast number of bottled inks and to express yourself…
This is a good question that should probably be asked more often of a lot of types of everyday equipment that has very high-end, expensive…
Japanese companies have a long history of making high quality fountain pens, which shouldn’t be a surprise when you consider Japan’s art and writing culture.…
The Parker “51” was the single most successful fountain pen in the history of … well … fountain pens! It stands to reason then that…
China has had a long history of fountain pen production btu recently they have cottoned on to the growth in the fountain pen market and…
(a work in progress) In my recent exploration of the world of fountain pens and inks I’ve been collecting a few old British ink bottles…
When you fall down the rabbit hole that is fountain pens you quickly learn then it’s not just inks you need to worry about or…
Last year I thought I’d get a cheap fountain pen (Faber-Castell Fresh), just to see what they were like these days as I had…
There’s a lot of buzz right now around the emerging field of “generative artificial intelligence” – online, publicly available machine learning models that can create…
Sometimes when I see a print in auction I am intrigued but something looks a bit wrong or I’m in 2 minds whether to bid.…
Here is a lovely little play programme (see all the pages below) that would have been bought by someone who went to see a kabuki…
This is actually 2 deliveries that arrived within a few weeks of each other. Most of these haven’t been identified yet so watch this apace!…
Banzuke are theatre programs distributed to audience members, showcasing information about upcoming performances and the actors who will be performing. Some were purely for advertisement…
This is a lovely and quite unusual series in that it is in the smaller chuban format, half the size of the usual oban. Title:…
This is one of my favourite series – the production quality is very high, with lots of lovely bokashi and bold clashing colours with that…
This is another hugely under appreciated series by Kunichika working in collaboration with lesser known artists of the late Meiji era such as Kaoru Umemoto.…
Signature: 国周筆 Kunichika hitsu; Date: 1870-1871 明治04 (1871) / 06 Censor seal 未六改; Publisher: 万屋 孫兵衛 Yorozuya Magobē; Carver: 片田彫長 Katada Chojirō This fairly…
Toyohara Kunichika, 1883; “The Popularity of the Upstairs Dressing Room” (Gakuya no nikai kage no hyoban); Publisher: Takazawa Fusajiro; Size: Ôban 37.5 x 25 cms…
This is a batch of rather lovely prints that were being sold in Japan from a collection amassed over 45 years. The quality of the…