Field Trip: UN Luggage Fine Writing Instrument Night

On Thursday, September 16, 2010 - yes, I know, this was almost a month ago - U.N Luggage hosted a "Fine Writing Instrument Night". Mr. Michael Pons - (I don't know his exact title, I believe he is the head of Lamy distribution in Canada...) was present and he brought a whole bunch of pens from Lamy, Visconti, Dunhill, Graf Von Faber-Castell and Acme Studios. First, it was eye candy. Second, they had cheese and chocolate and crackers and drinks AND prizes! And 15% off all writing instruments...

In the following fabulous image (sarcasm. I know they're terrible pictures. I was too excited to care), you can see the folder in the bottom right corner...full of all sorts of magnificent pens. I suspect the retail value of said folder is well into the thousands. I touched that folder. That's correct. My fingerprints are on it. All over it.

Usually Kevin and I don't go out and do cultured things because we're a) too lazy b) not interested and/or c) don't want to go through the boringness of traffic but for this, we made our way down to U.N Luggage, located on McDermot. I actually put on jeans and wore boots. Wow. This is huge for me because usually I get home from school/work and put on sweatpants. Poor Kevin.

It was great fun dipping all the fountain pens he brought and trying them out. He had a bottle of blue-black Dunhill ink out and it was a beautiful color. It was rich and vibrant and a good match for the pen sampling. Included in the collections he brought were Pen of the Year 2010 by Visconti and Graf Von Faber-Castell. They were priced upwards of $3000 CND. I won't lie, I'd never before considered I'd ever want to spend that much on a pen and if it were pocket change to me, I probably would have bought them. They're amazing works of art, those pens. I can't even draw stick people. I don't understand how people can create a masterpiece of a pen. I wish I had taken better pictures of the PoTY when I was there, but I don't think pictures would do the details justice anyway. Mr. Pons was explaining that many people buy the PoTY and hold on to it. As years pass and collectors start hunting for their archives, the pens sell for much higher. I guess it's like owning really, really nice cars? Personally, I would use them. Why have something so awesome and not use it?

Visconti Homo Sapiens: "Visconti Pens Introduces Fountain Pen Made of Lava With Virtually Pure 23 Karat Dreamtouch (TM) Palladium Nib"

Umm...yeah. If "Visconti Pens Introduces Fountain Pen Made of Lava With Virtually Pure 23 Karat Dreamtouch (TM) Palladium Nib" doesn't make you drool, I'm not sure what will. It's a wicked pen, fascinating to hold and touch. Not a texture you would expect at all. That line isn't mine, by the way, I found it here. A very cool, very masculine fountain pen. I'm a girl, and if I had it, I wouldn't feel like a man. But it's really cool for a man. Anyway, clearly I don't have this pen so there won't be much yammering from me about it. But there are many reviews out already on it. Consensus seems that it's fab.

Visconti Limited Edition Templar Fountain Pen

Visconti Limited Edition The Jewish Bible Silver Fountain Pen

Graf Von Faber-Castell Pen Of The Year 2010

And, just to make me look super cool because I associate with cool people...

Ok. So...that's all for now. But I have something very exciting in store...I have an exam tomorrow and I was really hoping for a package from JetPens today but maybe it'll come tomorrow. Therefore I shall sign off now but I will be back with more drool-worthy images. Oh, so many. Because I took a lot of pictures of my addictions this week. Instead of studying.