My Current Stationery Obsession(s)!

A Plethora

The spectrum of materials stationery encompasses seems endless. Stationery is often innocently thought of as customized paper with matching envelopes but below you will see the plethora of materials this one word encapsulates. While it does include envelopes and paper it is oh so much more!! The official Wikipedia definition is:

a mass noun referring to commercially manufactured writing materials, including cut paper, envelopes, writing implements, continuous form paper, and other office supplies.^[1] Stationery includes materials to be written on by hand (e.g., letter paper) or by equipment such as computer printers.

See??

I can scroll for hours looking at aesthetically pleasing storage solutions, paper, office accessories, etc.

Gah!

Over the years I’ve touched a bit on my infatuation with stationery. Truth be told I was embarrassed by it until I stumbled upon hundreds if not thousands of Instagram accounts of others who appreciate it as much as myself. It didn’t take long before my feed was dedicated to all things stationery (and art). As an adolescent, my favorite pastime was playing school. I was Ms. Debbie Smith. I took my job seriously 😂. A few stories are floating around about my school playing days. Not too long ago I realized what drew me to it and low and behold it has always been… You guessed it… Stationery.

These days I get stuck more so on a brand that suits my design style than a product. The quality is of utmost importance. That is part of the criteria. Followed by the aesthetics. Both must align for me to consider making a purchase soooo in saying that, allow me to list my current obsessions.

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While I am an Amazon associate, none of the links included in this post is affiliate. I did not receive the products mentioned in an exchange for my review. All opinions are my own.

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Favorite Brand

I am currently stalking Russell+Hazel. Like seriously. I look at their website at least once a day. The selection is minimal therefore making my efforts slim but I can’t help myself!! I am goo-goo over the color scheme of black, acrylic, grey, white, and gold. They do offer a few other colors, pale blues and muted pink paired with gold foil accents.

The selection of acrylic organization and desk accessories hypnotize me ☺️. I was introduced to the brand by accident. Some of you may be familiar with Dirt Cheap but if not it’s an unorganized store that purchases product containers from certain retailers and then resells the products for a cheaper price. Well, I was digging through the store’s stash and I came upon a nice leather planner, the one I am currently using. It was already halfway into the year but at $5, I couldn’t pass it up. As I began using it I fell in love. I found myself using it instead of looking for another one. They call it planner happiness for a reason.

I Googled the brand when deciding on 2022’s planner and to my amazement, I opened a treasure chest!! Have a look for yourself. If you are anything like me you are sure to be pleased.

Favorite Pen

For a little over a year, I have used the same brand of pen. The S-Gel by Sharpie is a gel .07 tip pen that glides smoothly across any paper. The dry time isn’t long and the ink is deep black. The white design pairs with my love of the black and white aesthetic. They sell this pen at Walmart so it is fairly attainable for anyone who wishes to give it a go.

S-Gel by Sharpie

Favorite Paper

Now this category is tricky. While I collect paper, my exploration of writing paper is almost non-existent. The papers that my collection consists of are of the vintage kind and designer kind. Don’t get me wrong, my collection includes notebooks purchased on a whelm as well as others gifted to me, all of which have writing papers. I’ll break this favorites section down a little different.

Since stumbling upon my favorite pen, I now know I prefer gel ink. Check. I know that I do not like ink to bleed through the paper. Check. I have come to conclude that while I enjoy college-ruled I prefer my pages without ruling so that I am not limited to writing, however, 2022’s journal has a faint grey ruling and will be dedicated to writing. Weird, I know. I discovered I like the freedom blank pages offer so three out of four for 2022’s stack are blank paged. Now that absolutely no sense has been made, my choice of blank paper is Tomoe River. During my paper research, I learned Tomoe River recently changed the quality of its paper product, to the dismay of many. My opinion of the quality is based on the older product.

52 g/m2 fills the Galen Leather co. notebook I’ve almost used from cover to cover. Filling a notebook has been a goal of mine for some time and I am 10 pages away from accomplishing said goal!! Yay!! Ok on to the paper. Tomoe River paper is thin, fountain pen-friendly paper. There is no bleed-through or ghosting which from its thinness is shocking. It is a Japanese company with a reputation for the quality of its paper.

As I unpack my studio, I will document other favorites. What types of pens and paper do you prefer?? Do you have a particular brand that captivates you?