Received this in trade for one of my pens as well as for doing some restoration/repair work to one of his pens.

This is the second Waterman pen I've ever touched since getting into fountain pens, the previous was a Waterman Laureat which I wasn't particularly impressed with.

A Charleston in Black with a Rhodium trim and an 18K rhodium plated medium. So far it's pretty nice, initially there was some fuss with the nib where I had to go back and re-start the stroke on nearly every other word particularly with Rhodia or similarly smooth surfaces but nipped that issue in the bud. The nib and feed were just friction fit and wasn't difficult to remove making it a bit easy to clean.

I like the weight on it (25g), and it's not really a big pen but it's not too small either and seems to post well enough. The barrel band is a nice art-deco pattern on the opposite side of the word 'waterman'.

So far the main unappealing part of it if I were nit-picking would be the injection molded plastic. As a result of being injection molded it's got a sharp-ish seam straight down the back of the cap, as well as the front of the cap (which is covered by the clip directly centered on the seam). The grip/section has the same seams. But since the feed and section is a circle in shape the nib can be rotated to where the seams don't bug you.

Alternatively I guess I could also buff out the seams to be smoother with some micro-mesh or polishing compound, but it doesn't exactly bug me, just was noticeable when I was feeling up the cap.

It clips pretty well to my shirt pocket and seems pretty attractive in the pocket especially the little Waterman badge at the top of the clip.



Write sample on some Rhodia No.16 pad and using Iroshizuku Syo-ro. If you click the image the larger 300 DPI scan is linked.



It's wet enough that it gives that red sheen from Syo-ro on Rhodia, which is quite a bit noticeable to the naked eye, but seems hard for me to photograph (you can somewhat see it in the scan above at the edges of the pooled area).



The nib is pretty smooth. Initially it was writing closer to a western Fine until I adjusted for wetness/etc. The 18K Fine on my Parker Ellipse (made in France with the P/W mark on it, which I assume means Waterman manufactured it) is a bit smoother/softer and nicer than the nib on the Charleston, but the Charleston body feels more comfortable than the Ellipse's.