Check this out! Beautiful Award-Winning Pens!

KOSMOS is an Award-Winning Pen with a Minimalist Design That Will Inspire the Next Generation of Creators

August 10, 2016, Munich, Germany – KOSMOS, the international award winning pen that combines a revolutionary new mechanism with an intuitive and minimal design, is live on Kickstarter and raising funds to bring the project to life.

A 2016 Winner of the Red Dot Design Award, a prestigious and world- renowned honor bestowed to the best of the best in outstanding design, the KOSMOS is a pen seeking a spot in every creative’s daily essentials.

“We designed KOSMOS with the intention to be a daily companion. Regardless of the occasion or the style you choose, KOSMOS will blend in perfectly, because of its subtle but distinct design,” says founder Christoph Bohrer, “Make your choice from four colors for an ideal match with your individual fashion and accessories.”

The KOSMOS pen features a groundbreaking new design that unlocks the pen with a simple shift of the cap. The magnetic forces inside KOSMOS are perfectly balanced and a strong Neodymium magnet holds the cap safely in the idle and writing position. Each part of KOSMOS is lathed from a solid block of a highly durable aluminum alloy known for its strength and frequently used in aerospace engineering.
The KOSMOS pen in 4 distinct finishes that pair up perfectly with many of Apple’s own devices; comet grey, and star silver, along with two Kickstarter-Exclusive colors galaxy gold and rose moon.

”We believe there is nothing more creative than a pen and a blank sheet of paper. This cosmos is reflected in the design of our writing utensil. The bush parts are seemingly levitating over the shank and hold in position by balanced forces. Shifting the bush parts back and forth emerges or hides the ball pen cartridge. In order to realize this intuitive design, we have put in question every detail and function of writing utensils. The result is a unique mechanism based on magnets, which allows the pen to have different appearances in the writing and the idle position.”
KOSMOS, winner of the world’s best pen for 2016, is currently live and available to support on Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/stilform/kosmos

About stilform:
stilform is a small design studio based in Munich, which is operated by Christoph Bohrer, Alexander Schmitke and Martin Wagner. It was founded in 2013 and creates products in the area of home & living as well as diverse industrial products. Their young spirit leads to a deep understanding of modern society and its needs for innovative creations. Always with the focus on creating visually appealing products with clear lines and esthetic form language, attributes like emotions, function and innovation are of utmost importance in the design process. Every design process starts with an empty sheet of paper and each time the project ends with a creative solution. Inspiration comes from nature, science and other areas that help to create a simplified everyday life. With this background customers and users will benefit from long-lasting products.
For more information on stilform please visit http://www.stilform-design.de
You can also Fan stilform on www.facebook.com/stilform.design or follow stilform via Instagram @stilform.

KOSMOS is an Award-Winning Pen with a Minimalist Design That Will Inspire the Next Generation of Creators

August 10, 2016, Munich, Germany – KOSMOS, the international award winning pen that combines a revolutionary new mechanism with an intuitive and minimal design, is live on Kickstarter and raising funds to bring the project to life.

A 2016 Winner of the Red Dot Design Award, a prestigious and world- renowned honor bestowed to the best of the best in outstanding design, the KOSMOS is a pen seeking a spot in every creative’s daily essentials.

“We designed KOSMOS with the intention to be a daily companion. Regardless of the occasion or the style you choose, KOSMOS will blend in perfectly, because of its subtle but distinct design,” says founder Christoph Bohrer, “Make your choice from four colors for an ideal match with your individual fashion and accessories.”

The KOSMOS pen features a groundbreaking new design that unlocks the pen with a simple shift of the cap. The magnetic forces inside KOSMOS are perfectly balanced and a strong Neodymium magnet holds the cap safely in the idle and writing position. Each part of KOSMOS is lathed from a solid block of a highly durable aluminum alloy known for its strength and frequently used in aerospace engineering.
The KOSMOS pen in 4 distinct finishes that pair up perfectly with many of Apple’s own devices; comet grey, and star silver, along with two Kickstarter-Exclusive colors galaxy gold and rose moon.

”We believe there is nothing more creative than a pen and a blank sheet of paper. This cosmos is reflected in the design of our writing utensil. The bush parts are seemingly levitating over the shank and hold in position by balanced forces. Shifting the bush parts back and forth emerges or hides the ball pen cartridge. In order to realize this intuitive design, we have put in question every detail and function of writing utensils. The result is a unique mechanism based on magnets, which allows the pen to have different appearances in the writing and the idle position.”
KOSMOS, winner of the world’s best pen for 2016, is currently live and available to support on Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/stilform/kosmos

About stilform:
stilform is a small design studio based in Munich, which is operated by Christoph Bohrer, Alexander Schmitke and Martin Wagner. It was founded in 2013 and creates products in the area of home & living as well as diverse industrial products. Their young spirit leads to a deep understanding of modern society and its needs for innovative creations. Always with the focus on creating visually appealing products with clear lines and esthetic form language, attributes like emotions, function and innovation are of utmost importance in the design process. Every design process starts with an empty sheet of paper and each time the project ends with a creative solution. Inspiration comes from nature, science and other areas that help to create a simplified everyday life. With this background customers and users will benefit from long-lasting products.

For more information on stilform please visit http://www.stilform-design.de
 

Things to look forward to

School is starting again and that is always a joyous time. It means shopping for stationery, even though I left school decades ago. ;-) There is more to look forward to these months. This Fall Paperblanks, which is one of my favorite notebook makers, comes up with new notebooks, such as Embellished Manuscripts. I cannot wait. Here is some more information about it.

Coming Up This Fall: New Embellished Manuscripts, Special Series and Formats

Posted on August 2, 2016 by Paperblanks

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It may be only the beginning of August, but we already have autumn on our minds. Our Fall 2016 collection is coming to stores and we are so excited to share these new designs with you!
This year we are introducing not just two fabulous new series (Nova Stella and Florentine Cascade) and Embellished Manuscripts journals (Yeats, Easter 1916 and Bach, Cantata BWV 112) but two special new editions as well!

Our new Signature Editions celebrate the hallmarks of what makes Paperblanks books so special: book edge printing, elegant and ornate cover designs, pages and pages of high-quality writing paper.
We are also bringing William Shakespeare back to our collection for a limited time with our Shakespeare’s 400th Anniversary Special Edition journal and stationery accessories, honouring the 400th anniversary of his death.

Over the coming weeks, we will introduce each new series to you and celebrate the rich creative history behind the artwork.

About Paperblanks: At Paperblanks, we believe that art should have a place in all aspects of life. That’s why we follow the artist’s way in everything we do – creating, crafting and releasing designs we believe have the power to touch people. For more about Paperblanks, go to our website at paperblanks.com.

Take the May Story-a-Day Challenge! with the Paperblanks app

Paperblanks does not only have the most beautiful notebooks one can imagine, on their website they regularly offer writing advice and inspiration tips. Take a look at www.paperblanks.com

This week they featured the Story-a-Day Challenge! Read here more about it.

May is a wonderful month. It brings Mother’s Day, the end of April showers and a variety of reading and writing awareness opportunities!
This coming month is not only “Get Caught Reading Month” and the American “National Short Story Month” but also home to the Story-a-Day Challenge. Sort of like National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) for those of us with shorter attention spans, “Story-a-Day May” challenges its participants to write and finish a short story (any length) every day this month.

To help give you a head start, we are releasing thirty-one creative writing prompts on the Paperblanks Journal Prompts App! If you don’t have it downloaded yet, it’s a super simple and easy-to-use app that gets you started in a new journalling direction when you’re having trouble thinking of a new topic.


Our May Prompts are the first creative writing selections we have released on the app. Beginning tomorrow, April 28th, you can find them in Settings –> Select Categories under “Story-a-Day.”
Exclusively for our Endpaper Blog readers, here is an advance look at five new writing prompts:

1. It had been two weeks and now they were the only ones left…
2. No call had come through that phone in years, but today it rang…
3. They came back every year to this same spot…
4. There’s a reason they tell you to save the best for last…
5. The mountains loomed in the distance as…

So what are you waiting for? Grab your favourite notebook and start planning out your next month of writing!

About Paperblanks^®: At Paperblanks, we believe that art should have a place in all aspects of life. That’s why we follow the artist’s way in everything we do – creating, crafting and releasing designs we believe have the power to touch people. For more about Paperblanks, go to our website at paperblanks.com.










 

Colour yourself happy with Bruynzeel/Sakura

Recently, I wrote about Bruynzeel/Sakura. I reviewed their Pigma Micron Pens which are ideal for writing and drawing, doodling, sketching and Zentangling. In my post I briefly mentioned the colouring pencils that I used to draw and color with when I was younger. It did not take long for me to try the Bruynzeel colouring pencils and their watercolour pencils and I was delighted. What a happy bunch of colours!

 

Firstly, when I opened up the boxes of the colouring and the watercolouring pencils, each containing 24 pencils, the beauty of the rainbow of colours struck me. Each colour has its own charm. Really bright and overjoyous colors, exactly what you need when you want to color. For a second I thought it would be a shame to use them, I just wanted to look at them in a pristine shape and keep them as precious as they are. Secondly, holding the pencils in my hand I noticed that compared to many years ago, the weight of the pencils is lighter. This makes it easier to draw and makes your hand less tired. Thirdly, the pencils are made from wood and this you can definitely tell. You get an authentic feel from it. But the best part is the drawing and colouring experience. The colors are fantastic! On the first evening I started drawing with them, I drew about 7 pages of drawings. 

These are all my own drawings.

When I started drawing and colouring with the pencils, I noticed how fine the colours materialized on the paper. My first drawing was a purple drawing of a somewhat mystical figure. It almost came automatically out of my pencil. With the Bruynzeel pencils the colouring of the paper is very smooth because of the light weight of the coloring pencil and the quality of the inside. You can make different shades in any way you want it: the more you colour it in the darker the background become and/or the harder you press, the darker it becomes. I also noticed the colours can be blended easily with each other. Since I had 24 colors and I knew there could be shades of a certain colour, I tried creating a darker or a lighter shade in a drawing and that worked very well.

Flowers are one of the most grateful subjects to draw and my drawings became lovely with the colours, if I may say so myself. Furthermore, I decided to make a series of drawings of a woman’s face with curly hair that is inspired by curlz/zentangle doodles that I came up with when I used the Pigma Micron pens.

 

My box with watercolour pencils is similar to the regular colouring pencils. If you look closely to the colours, they differ somewhat and you can perfectly use them in combination. For instance, I found the colours orange and pink from both boxes subtly different shades of each other and the mixed very well. Just drawing and colouring with the watercolour pencils is as nice as always but the excitement of the watercolour pencils are of course the part where you put the water on it. Try them yourself and let the colours make you happy!

The special pencil of Pentel

Pentel is a Japanese stationery organization that has many types and varieties of pens. Last year I started reviewing them because there are still many people out there who have not tried any of the Pentel pens. Yet they are such happy-making brand with delightful pens. I love them and the organization. I was familiar with the gelpens and art products of Pentel but not with the mechanical pencils. In general, I have given little attention to mechanical pencils in my blog.

 

In the past I used a lot of mechanical pencils, especially in high school, but for some reason I stopped using them. I still own a few of them but haven’t used them in years, some even more than a decade. From that time on a lot has changed, and technology has entered our lives. The world of the mechanical pencil has not stood still either. Also there the highest technology has entered. Pentel introduced the ORENZ mechanical pencil with a 0.2 mm! diameter lead that does not break during use. Everyone who has ever written with a mechanical pencil knows that it is very frustrating when the point breaks. It happened to me when I was in high school, practicing for exams. In fact, I think that is the reason why I stopped using them because I would write a few sentences and the tip would break, causing me to be distracted. So when I saw Pentel having their ORENZ mechanical pencil that would not break during the use of it, I had to give it a try.

I am very happy that I tried it! The pencils look more like pens when the tip is inside the pen. Not only are these mechanical pencils very comfortable in your hand when you use them, they also come in the most beautiful colors. And the best part of it, they deliver what they promise. I use my pens and pencils mostly for writing so I tried them for my writing and it was heaven! The tip of the mechanical pencil is so strong, I had the feeling I was writing with steel that leaves a mark like a pencil. At the same time, when you touch the tip, you can feel it is still a pencil tip.

When I tried to draw with them, the feeling is even better. And still, the tip did not break during use. This mechanical pencil is even perfect for those professionals that use mechanical pencils as a standard, such as architects and industrial designers, and other professionals who need to draw and make graphic sketches for their work. There is a promo film about this mechanical pencil and it is very artistic. You can check it out here http://pentel-orenz.com/ . It is entertaining and it shows what is possible with this mechanical pencil. Check out the mechanical pencil for yourself!