Where Do You Intend To Go With Pen Collecting?

[top pen]

I realise this is a fairly ambiguous thread. However I have been questioning exactly this lately. For me it all started a little over a year ago when I was looking for simply a better pen then those cheap pilot G1 gel pens that gave me hand cramp. That evolved into trying to build up a group of pens I enjoyed using that offered some variety that I would use in a rotation.

If anyone is interested this the group of pens I own;
Parker Reflex, 15 (Red GT set), I.M (Silver), 3x Frontiers (Twilight, Teal Chrome-Flair, Flighter) Parker Sonnet (Dark Grey GT)
Lamy Safari (Neon), Studio (Stainless Steel)
Rotring Esprit (Tourmaline), Freeway (Blue)
Sheaffer Intensity (Violet set)
Cross Century II (Barley Corn)
Pelikan M200 (Black)
+ 3 or 4 cheap pens I have left off

I think these goals have been accomplished. However I’ve been questioning where to go from here. The rate at which I have been acquiring pens isn’t really sustainable and I’ve been guilty of wasting money on cheap pens without the foresight that the money spent on several budget pens would have bought me the pen I really wanted in the first place.

From here on In I’m hoping to buy one pen a year and slim things down to ten pens before the end of next year with the intention of building up a small collections of pens I enjoy using with a lot more variety. I haven’t looked into vintage pens yet however I’m waiting until I’ve finished my studies to do so and also by putting this off it means that it means that my enthusiasm won’t get the better of me. With this slowly edging towards a goal of no more than 25 pens including the classics e.g. a Parker 51 and Vacumatic, a Waterman 52, a Pelikan M600 and 100N etc

So I was wondering if others had considered this and if they have an end goal in mind.

[Crazyorange]

That's a great question. I find myself wondering the same thing. I know for sure that I don't want a "bunch of pens". Where to go from here I don't know. So I'm interested to hear from others.

[tarheel1]

I just plan on buying what pens strike me the right way. There ar3 a couple of vintage pens that i am looking for but besides that i am open.

[da vinci]

I have been thinking about this too. As soon as I think I have the answer I change my mind! That tends to happen when I sit down to sort out the pens I am going to sell or see a pen for sale that I want but doesn't fit my intended strategy!

I have a few lamys and mb 144/5/classiques. I enjoy using these pens and cannot let them go. I have a couple of top end pens that I think I will keep as heirlooms (although I am not going anywhere for a while I hope!).

Then i have a bunch of pens that I enjoy owning but dont use that often. They all get into rotation eventually. But this is the tier that needs slimming down.

I have 3 pens that I "have to buy" this year. I am pretty focussed on that.

Ideally i would like to have 10 perfect writers, the heirlooms and the 2 "collections". I am a fair way away from that at present.

[mhosea]

Since I'm a user first and collector second (with no interest in collecting anything I wouldn't, at least theoretically, like to use), I'm leaning towards pens that please me ergonomically. I thought it was going to be the MB 149 size of grip, which I also have on my Bexley Poseidon Magnums. I was thinking about a Pelikan M1000, and for the last couple of months I was trying to secure a Sailor King of Pen for a a better price than I was able to manage. However, I recently traded for a Pelikan M800 EF, and while the balance is a little farther back than I would think ideal, I actually think this pen fits my hand and grip the best of any pen I have ever tried, bar none. The next best fits are my earlier large Sheaffer flat-tops, and after that, my later model oversize Sheaffer Balance pens. I've never held a Parker Vacumatic Maxima, so I need to try some out (will do at the Commonwealth Pen Show in 3 weeks time). But apart from the Maxima possibility, and anything of a similar ilk that may present itself to me at the show (that I can also afford), I think I need a blue-striated Pelikan M800 with a Fine or Medium nib.

[Cob]

A nice idea for a thread; my compliments.

As for my answer, well the bug bit and since then I have been blundering about with no focus - and certainly no long-term goal.

I like handwriting even if I have to invent reasons for it, and I like taking pens to bits and making them work and I am interested in the various different designs and engineering approaches etc., and there are lots of pens that I would like to have but probably not for long. So I buy some and sell some, but somehow the numbers appear to be increasing I'm afraid, and worse there is a good-sized box full of carcases of defunct pens that seemed like a good idea or were bought for spares.

So the short answer is that there is no plan, no scheme and no logic; it just is!

Cob

[gbryal]

I definitely have enough pens now, with many dependable writers that would work well as an only pen. I plan to curtail my pen accumulation sharply and really start writing with them and let the best bubble to the top. I don't regret that's taken me about 50 pens (all under $150) to find out what I like and dislike, though if I ignored some people and paid better attention to others it could have perhaps been fewer.

One thing I've learned is no one else can tell you what pens you like, or even what pens will write best for you. I imagine if I was the social sort and tried to get to shows and stores to try these pens and see them in person, I'd have felt less need to buy something to try it. Then again, some pens you have to live with for a while.

I think a collection of two pens is admirable and maybe someday if I am very ruthless I can get mine down to that. One for home and one for the road. One to keep if the other needs a repair. Maybe three; sometimes you need a backup when you leave your backup at home.

There is a faint call to explore some of the more expensive pens. There doesn't seem to be anything like the urushi Platinums and Nakayas. Yet I feel I can admire them from afar.

I can see now that I could have been happy with a few combinations of pens. My Safari is everything I need, maybe it could have led to a 2000. If the Esterbrooks were just a little bigger, I would have bought a few then sought out every kind of nib and would have been content. With just my Waterman 94 and another like it, that would have been more pen then I'd ever need, classic and maintainable. Once I learned of after market nibs, I might have been happy with a few Jinhao 450s. My Edison Hudson is excellent, and if I just had that and one more I can't see wanting for anything else. And now, TWSBI has impressed me with the quality of their Vac 700s and their service; these days they are all I want to write with.

But I have them all and dozens more, and they are hard to let go, and there is always the promise of some new thing, like my recent exploration of Parkers and Parker-likes. I suppose to the experienced collectors (really, I am just a pen accumulator, I hope not just a hoarder) already know where this all leads and are just nodding sagely. But I have to find out for myself I guess, isn't life funny that way?

[VertOlive]

I've been thinking along these lines for the last month or so. I'm coming up on my one year anniversary since returning to fountain pens and found I was creeping past 3 dozen pens [39 to be exact]. I came by this hoard honestly, like most people new to fountain pens, by reaching for those that took my eye and were affordable enough. I learned a lot along the way about what I really like in a pen and the fact that many of my own pens didn't fit those criteria caused a minor crisis.

I put six of them up for sale. I have 10 on PIFs and suddenly feel oddly relieved.

What I have now is a more coherent two dozen pens--coherent in the sense I like the way they look and the way they write. Some are slated for a nib doctoring to bring them more in line with my preferences, but they made the cut because they please my eye.

I now have a very small list of "Pens Left to Buy", a Nakaya, another Delta, and an Edison, and have left a "space" in my collection for some future pen that may delight me, but which I haven't encountered yet!

[david i]

New Orleans.

-d

[snedwos]

Debtors' prison.

[Crazyorange]

Debtors' prison.

Ha ha...it's that what college is for?

[Kaputnik]

Good question. Although I didn't set out to be a collector, I have certainly been one for the past few years. But am I still a collector if I just keep what I have and don't add to it? Am I still one if I get one more fountain pen a year from now, and another a couple of years after that?

I'm not looking to get rid of any superfluous pens, selling them as some people do to pay for other pens they want. I don't rule out selling some, giving away others, but they don't take up all that much room, and there is no urgency about it.

Certainly I now have more than enough fountain pens that write as well and dependably as I could wish for. So that isn't a goal. Finding some vintage nib with more flex than any I have so far would be nice, but my handwriting probably wouldn't do justice to it.

Filling systems interest me, and I don't yet have a button filler or a Snorkel. And yet, I find that I'm not as interested in looking for one as I would have been a year ago.

Perhaps for now, my intent is to stop thinking like a collector, and just continue writing (which I've been doing all along).

[Fawkes]

I originally started out buying them with a user's mindset, but now I have focused on collecting Pelikans and Montblancs from the 20s through mid-50s. I have about 6 pens that are my go-to users and rotate through the collection, but the end goal is to have a complete collection of the Pels and MBs that interest me.

[Waski_the_Squirrel]

Pens are meant to be used.

I have been horrified by the realization that I have a lot of pens and inks that I will never use. Better that I cut down my collection to the pens and inks that I will love and use. Last year, I cut back the collections. This year, I know that I didn't come close to cutting the collections enough.

[Quantum Sailor]

I have been continuously refining what pens interest me for my own collection. I have begun to restore pens and that's a fun hobby for me, but the majority of the pens that I restore will end up on ebay or posted for sale here.

As for collecting for personal use I'm not interested in any pens that I won't actually use regularly. It doesn't matter how rare the pen is if I won't use it I won't buy it. I mainly am interested in British pens from the 20's to the 50's. Modern pens really haven't been catching my eye since I started getting vintage. I have issues with paying a lot of money for a pen that uses a converter. I also have been starting to learn some different styles of writing so that different nibs are coming onto my radar that originally I wasn't interested in.

[Laura N]

Pens are meant to be used.

I have been horrified by the realization that I have a lot of pens and inks that I will never use. Better that I cut down my collection to the pens and inks that I will love and use. Last year, I cut back the collections. This year, I know that I didn't come close to cutting the collections enough.

That may be true for you, and I respect that outlook. But it's not true for everyone. I have met a lot of people who seriously collect fountain pens either for investment or because they see them as bits of history. Many of these collectors don't use fountain pens. They just collect them. And I respect that, too. There's nothing wrong with it. If you collect art deco pottery, you don't necessarily use your collection to hold flowers.

Then there are a lot of regular people who use pens, but not every single pen they have. Look at some of us who have a number of the same pen model in different materials or colors. An easy example is me and my Safaris. I must have 30 different Safaris and Al-Stars. I don't consciously set any aside, but there are some I haven't gotten around to using, and may never use. Because at a certain point, why bother? In use, a Safari is a Safari. And not using some doesn't hurt anyone, including me. I still enjoy having them. They look nice sitting there in their rows, waiting for Lamy to give them a purple Safari to play with.

People are different. People enjoy pens for different reasons. The only thing I know is: the pens don't care.

[mhosea]

Pens are meant to be used.

Every time somebody says that, I think of these:

http://www.st-dupont.com/en/our-coll...asterpieces/#7

[Jon Szanto]

But it's not true for everyone.

What she said.

Actually, it is a little baffling for me to understand this incomprehension of the variety of relationships with pens. I'll admit: for the first 3 months or so after I came online and joined a pen forum, I personally couldn't understand the collector mindset. Hell, I had two pens in my desk that I needed to make work, I made that happen, and then I figure all pens were made for that purpose alone.

Silly me.

And the intervening years have deepened my understanding of the bond between people and their writing instruments, which isn't an either/or, but a broad spectrum of usage <--> collection. People are into new pens, cheap pens, expensive pens, vintage pens and everything in the panorama. And I am way good with all of it, from the "don't you dare ink that stickered 51" to the "I can't wait to put BSB in my new Preppie!".

As for where I intend to go with my pen collecting, I figure "to infinity, and beyond!" is the only fair answer.



P.S. And total lulz on Mike's link!

[Runnin_Ute]

Well my "collection" such as it is - roughly 15 pens, started back in the 1990's - first with a Lamy Al Star, then added a Waterman Phileas. Fast forward to Dec 2012, when I bought another Phileas off the classifieds at FPN. Since then I have added others, including two Parker 45's (regular and Flighter) a Parker 51 Special fp/mp set, a Esterbrook J, four Pelikan's - two M205's, a 120 Merz & Krell and a M150. I went from being all over the place, to a more focused collection. I use ALL of my pens. My current focus is as you can tell, Parker (mostly vintage/semi vintage) and Pelikan. A pen I would like to get in the next 6-12 months is a Pelikan 140 or maybe a regular Parker 51 - aero or vac, doesn't matter. I don't see me getting beyond 20-25 though.

[igor61]

Since i was a kid (now i am 53 years old), i was fascinated with fountain pens (and i am still love them). I began buying and using them. Now, i own more than 300 pens.

It's true, there are some pens that i never use.

I always carry 3 pens, when they are out of ink, y rotate them.

I don't know if i am a collector, or simply i like and use them.

It's like any other article that people like, for example watches, ho many do you need, and use?. Some people had 50 or more.

I also like books and music. If you ask me if i am a collector of these, i don't think so, even that i own more than 2500 cd's, 2000 LPs, i simply love music.

My last pen that i purchased was 2 years ago.