Mod_wolves
August 18th, 2013, 01:36 PM
After reading the book "Pen Repair" by Jim Marshall and Laurence Oldfield I found that there was a shop around an hour and a half from Chester in Kendal called A.B.C Lloyd specialists in vintage fountain pens and modern pens.
I convinced my partner that this "short" trip to Kendal would be nice we'd see the town have a nice time and at the same time have our first visit to an actual brick and mortar pen shop. I told her we would be there for a good couple of hours (as a joke) so we had our wander around Kendal and then decided to go to the shop. We found it very easily and enjoyed the display cabinets in the way upstairs to the shop. The shop itself is unusual being 1/4 pen shop 3/4 hair dressers. Despite this we had an absolutely fantastic time. We spent a good hour and a half there and that was only because they were closing. From the moment we arrived we felt welcome. A lady from the hairdressers was initially there to welcome us and could not have been more helpful. Around 5 minutes later Alan the owner came down. He was one of the friendliest people we had met, he could not have been more helpful.
In the shop it had pens from every era and Alan could haven given a story for every pen inside the shop which showed us that it wasn't just a shop for him, It was a passion. We spent our whole time talking pens and not once felt a hard sell. We both showed an interest and he saw this so within minutes of chatting with him he came out with a and full of dip nibs and two nib holders for free. We were both blown away by this generosity. Neither of us expected such a positive experience from going to his shop. He has lent us a book on calligraphy and has asked us to return in 3 months to see whether our hand writing has improved. This is a new experience for the both of us as a shop has never lent us a book so we can return in several months (except for libraries). This has shown us both how generous and trusting the fountain pen community is. We will be returning in 3 months time to do some shopping and to show Alan our (hopefully) fantastic writing styles.
I've written this to show people how fantastic this shop is and if you can go there, you won't be disappointed. Even if you have no money on you you will still have a good time chatting.
I am not affiliated with the shop.
I convinced my partner that this "short" trip to Kendal would be nice we'd see the town have a nice time and at the same time have our first visit to an actual brick and mortar pen shop. I told her we would be there for a good couple of hours (as a joke) so we had our wander around Kendal and then decided to go to the shop. We found it very easily and enjoyed the display cabinets in the way upstairs to the shop. The shop itself is unusual being 1/4 pen shop 3/4 hair dressers. Despite this we had an absolutely fantastic time. We spent a good hour and a half there and that was only because they were closing. From the moment we arrived we felt welcome. A lady from the hairdressers was initially there to welcome us and could not have been more helpful. Around 5 minutes later Alan the owner came down. He was one of the friendliest people we had met, he could not have been more helpful.
In the shop it had pens from every era and Alan could haven given a story for every pen inside the shop which showed us that it wasn't just a shop for him, It was a passion. We spent our whole time talking pens and not once felt a hard sell. We both showed an interest and he saw this so within minutes of chatting with him he came out with a and full of dip nibs and two nib holders for free. We were both blown away by this generosity. Neither of us expected such a positive experience from going to his shop. He has lent us a book on calligraphy and has asked us to return in 3 months to see whether our hand writing has improved. This is a new experience for the both of us as a shop has never lent us a book so we can return in several months (except for libraries). This has shown us both how generous and trusting the fountain pen community is. We will be returning in 3 months time to do some shopping and to show Alan our (hopefully) fantastic writing styles.
I've written this to show people how fantastic this shop is and if you can go there, you won't be disappointed. Even if you have no money on you you will still have a good time chatting.
I am not affiliated with the shop.