Midori MD Cotton Notebook A4 Blank: A Review

(Susan M. Pigott is a fountain pen collector, pen and paperholic, photographer, and professor. You can find more from Susan on her blog Scribalishess.)

The Midori MD Cotton Notebook is a thread-bound notebook with 88 pages made from 20% cotton pulp. Like other MD notebooks, this one is minimalist in presentation, with a cardstock cover and see-through tape over the binding. It also has a ribbon bookmark.

Unlike the MD notebooks with Tomoe River paper (see review here), the cotton paper has a bit of texture.

This isn’t a bad thing. In fact, the cotton fiber absorbs ink more quickly than the Tomoe paper, so you won’t experience as much smearing. Fortunately, the paper’s absorbancy does not lead to bleeding or feathering even with the widest fountain pen nibs.

The paper is thin enough that fountain pen ink shows through (very slightly), but I didn’t experience any bleed through with regular writing.

When I tested the paper with my widest ruling pen and ink splats, I did experience bleed through, but you really have to lay a good bit of wet ink down for this to happen.

I also tested the paper drawing a picture with ink and using a water brush to blend the colors. The paper wrinkles up with moisture, so I wouldn’t recommend it for watercolors unless you don’t mind the wrinkling.

For writing, however, this is excellent paper. I wrote a portion of the first part of The Scarlet Letter and had no problems with fibers getting caught in the tines, ink bleeding, or smearing.

My one complaint about this notebook is that it’s not perforated, so if you want to remove pages, you wind up with a jagged edge. Other than that, the binding is tight and the notebook lays flat.

You can purchase the Midori MD Cotton Notebook in (almost) A4 size (Length is 27.5 cm /10.8 inches and Width is 21.0 cm/ 8.3 inches) from Jet Pens for $28.00.

(JetPens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

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MD Sticky Memo Pad: Sticky Notes that Write Great and Help You Stay Organized

(Original Mai-Bun article, posted on 2016/05/16. Written by Saori. Translated by Bruce Eimon.)

When you think of sticky notes, you probably think of those that come in bright yellow and pink colors, or those with cute decorations on them. That’s what comes to my mind too. One day at a stationery store, though, I came across a stack of plain looking cream colored sticky notes, sitting there alongside the colorful ones I was accustomed to seeing.

The MD Sticky Memo Pad is part of the MD PAPER PRODUCTS family by Midori, known for its high quality MD Notebooks, and also a sister company to the makers of the much loved TRAVELER’S notebooks. Just like the MD Notebook, the MD Sticky Memo Pad employs a simple design without any decorations.

They are offered in the same page formats as the MD Notebooks, with blank, 7mm lines, and a 5mm grid. For a person like myself who likes using my 5mm grid notebook, I can’t be happier for my favorite format to be available as a sticky-note.

From top to bottom: mechanical pencil, ball point pen, rollerball pen, magic marker.

Even as a sticky-note, it has the same smooth writing experience as the well known MD Notebooks. It handles all writing instruments exceedingly well, giving you a pleasurable writing no matter what you use.

Take it everywhere as your pocket notebook MD Sticky Memo Pads come with both a front and a rear cover, unlike regular sticky-notes which are fully exposed. This makes it easy to throw one into your purse or backpack, just like any other notebook.

There are two sizes: an A7 size (H102mm×W76mm) that peels up, and a larger A6 size (H150mm×W102mm) that peels sideways. Both are perfect sizes for taking quick notes “on the go” and are compact enough to fit in any bag or purse.

The one drawback of the pages being sticky is that you cannot flip them over to keep writing on the next page. To get around this, I suggest you peel off the notes after each use and stick them behind the front cover. Since the cover is slightly longer than the sticky notes themselves, they fit in just nicely without sticking out.

Very easy to move your jottings to your notebook, planner, or diary.

When you write something in a pocket notebook, it is quite tedious to copy that information to your other notebooks. With the MD Sticky Memo Pad, however, it is super easy to move your notes to your other notebooks. No extra tools, no extra time.

For a person like myself who uses my planner strictly to keep track of my schedule, I am thankful that I have the MD sticky-notes to take my notes on. And to be able to do this on high quality paper?! Why not pick the format of your choice and give this writing-pleasure a try?

Recommended for:

• People who already know and like the superior writing quality of MD Notebooks
• People who like the simple aesthetic
• People who like to quickly transfer their notes to other notebooks

Information: MD Sticky Memo Pad

You can purchase the MD Sticky Memo Pad in several sizes and formats in the US from JetPens.

The Midori MD Notebook (A5 Gridded): A Review

(Susan M. Pigott is a fountain pen collector, pen and paperholic, photographer, and professor. You can find more from Susan on her blog Scribalishess.)

The Midori MD Notebook is an A5-sized, 88 page (176 pages front and back) notebook with cream paper. I couldn’t find the actual paper weight on the Midori site, but they describe the paper as

"provid[ing] a fine balance between a slight catch on the paper when writing and a smooth writing feel. With this paper, you can enjoy the sensation of writing."

After writing on this notebook for a couple of weeks, I completely agree with that description.

The MD Notebook is packaged in a clear cellophane package. The notebook is wrapped in slightly opaque paraffin paper that you can remove or leave on for protection. I have a thing about the texture and crinkly sound of paraffin paper, so I’m keeping my notebook wrapped.

The notebook is bound in cardstock (though Midori is careful to say that this is not a cover—it’s more like the end pages you would find in a hardbound book. The notebook pages are bound using the traditional thread-stitched method. This allows the book to open completely flat.

In minimalistic fashion, the binding and stitching can be seen through the cheesecloth tape on the spine. This would normally be hidden underneath a hardbound cover. It really is quite beautiful. You can even see the book ribbon through the tape.

I chose the gridded version of the MD Notebook, but they also come in blank and 7mm lined. The gridded lines are 5mm, and there are tiny dots along the margins marking every 10 squares on the long edge and 10 and 5 squares long the top edge. This allows you to count characters if you like, or use the dots to create even grids.

I tested my MD Notebook in several different ways. I tried it with different pens and inks writing alphabets. It handled all three pens and inks perfectly with no bleed-through. The writing does show through the paper slightly, but I couldn’t get a good photo of it.

Top: Wahl-Eversharp Decoband with Kyo-Iro Moonlight ink, Middle: Pilot Custom 92 with Iroshizuku Shin-Kai ink; Bottom: Conid Minimalistica with Diamine Purple Pazzazz

One of the things I love about grid paper is the fact that you can write on it either in portrait or landscape. So, next I created a to-do chart for my Fall classes. The gridlines make it easy to create columns and checkboxes.

Next, I tested the paper with all of my currently-inked pens, a gel pen, and a rollerball. Again, no complaints. All the inks performed well.

Then I wrote a test page using the Emancipation Proclamation for text. I found the 5mm grid size to be too small for my usual handwriting. That’s probably because I’ve gotten accustomed to 7mm lines in my journal. For people who print or write using fine nibs, the size should be adequate. By the way, if you read the quote carefully (please don’t) you’ll see that I totally muffed it up. My eyes skipped an entire paragraph, so I’d make a horrible scribe.

I also did some ink swabs to see how the paper handled thick, wet ink. Once again, it aced the test. No bleedthrough at all.

The MD Notebook paper is really, really nice. I’m a Tomoe River Paper fan, but I must say, this MD Notebook is giving my Seven Seas Journal a run for the money. Both kinds of paper are fountain-pen friendly. Both papers come in creamy colors. Both papers are bleed-resistant. Both display sheeny inks well.

Hobonichi Cousin Tomoe Left; MD Notebook Right

The main difference between the two is Tomoe River Paper feels much thinner and smoother. MD Paper is thicker, and it has some tooth to it. That’s not to say that the paper is rough or catches your nib. It just provides more feedback.

Diamine Purple Pazzazz ink

You can purchase the Midori MD A5 Notebook Gridded at JetPens for $14.00. They also carry the blank and lined versions. If you want a sleek cover for your MD Notebook, you can get a goatskin cover for $84.00.

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