We had our first conversation in Shanghai. We talked about Art Deco. Did you know that Shanghai was a big spot in the early 20th century with all the modern western architecture from then? There are still amazing houses to be seen in the French Quartier. Soon we found out that we had common interests in design, paintings, sculptures, and buildings. And we both had this thing for writing, fountain pens and calligraphy. We love paper, colors, inks, fountain pens and the art of writing. Stationery has always been special to Emile and Astrid. She used to practice letters with a fountain pen since she was a little girl. During studies Astrid grew into sketching and watercolor paintings, with pens, pencils, inks and pigments. She used to search every stationery shop whatever town visited, which is a habit still. Later on calligraphy became more and more important. Journaling, too. Emile is keen on bookshops and writes down all his thoughts about new ideas and analyses down in journals and books. He bought his first notebook when he was twelf years old. The most wanted notebook would be filled with paper which could stand fountainpen writing – not always a succesful match of design and usability. But he continues to use a physical agenda, with some notebooks beside, to keep track of his meetings. Once you write something down, you can keep it in mind more easily. Using pens and paper bring ideas and thoughts to life and is an expression of our identity, thinking and creativity. The written word or drawing on paper has the power of genuineness and pureness that comes with simple tools and the respect of the moment. The access to good quality stationery has shaped her way of working and creating. Some of my favorites she developed on her own to shape them to their best use, to organize the day with a notebook and a pen, to have just the size notebook she wants. Every place we go we visit at least one stationery store and bookstore. We always get a lot of energy from new notebooks, immediately we dive in on the paper to assess for which application the paper is most suitable. New pen released? New color of ink? Have a try and talk about! A while ago we have found the art of bookbinding and origami folding beautiful add-ons to the interests. studying making books from scratch gives a lot: Mindfulness, craft, creativity. One can combine making paper, dying paper, painting paper, folding paper, binding paper, all to a single one-of-a-kind object. The pens, the paper, the inks, the books, Shanghai…….. we make our dream come true. Emile and Astrid would love to share this with you as well. Lots of writing and creating fun!
We have been working on this for years and now we have everything together and show you as much as possible about the things we love. we named our first ink edition after themes mostly found in Shanghai and called it ‘A Trip to Shanghai’. We developped a tiny book to carry all the colors of our growing ink collection wioth us to avoid dubbles (which we own for sure). We offer an amount of unique handmade notebooks of well suited writing- or drawing paper to keep writing and sketching all day long.