(Jeff Abbott is a regular contributor at The Pen Addict. You can find more from Jeff online at Draft Evolution and Twitter.)
The quest for the perfect notebook is never over, but like I'm sure I've said many times, you can sometimes find the perfect notebook for the specific use case. And this is why most of us continue picking up new notebooks even though we have plenty in our stash at home.
And that's exactly how the Paper-Oh! Yuko-Ori notebook got into my collection. I mean, look at that cover! Apart from the beautiful cover, this is a decent notebook that uses recycled, acid-free paper, but there are a couple draw-backs that you might need to consider.
Look & feel
First off, this notebook has a gorgeous cover. It reminds of calm deep water. It's a dark grey with hints of blue and a few glimmers here and there. It really is beautiful. According to the product description, the covers are inspired by the origami artwork of Yuko Nishimura. Very nice work indeed.
Speaking of the origami artwork, a small bookmark and info insert are included in the front cover of the notebook. Usually, I briefly glance at these things on the way to the recycling, but this caught my eye because of the way the insert was folded. After reading about the orgami artwork inspiration, it makes sense now. The non-orthodox folding method is really interesting — enough to convince me to keep it in the notebook for artistic value. Really nice touch.
The bookmark is also interesting. You can choose to use it as a standard bookmark that has a small tab to attach to a page, or you can use the adhesive patch to attach the bookmark to an inside page and fold it over the rest of the book (pictures are worth a thousand words here). Either way, it's unique and I like it.
Moving on to the paper, it's smooth to the touch and about the thickness of a Rhodia sheet of paper. The version I have is lined, and I'm not sure if you can get these notebooks in other formats. The line is a subtle light-gray that works well with the cover.
The binding leaves a little to be desired, but it gets the job done. I'm not 100% confident that this notebook would stay intact through its entire life, but it would probably make it through anyway. It opens very easily, but to a point where I wonder if certain sections will begin to fall out at some point. Only time will tell.
Overall, it's a beautiful notebook, a great pocket size, and a good thickness at 112 pages.
Writing performance
For the most part, the pen and ink tests are average. What does that mean? Well, gel-ink, rollerball, ballpoint, and pencil perform with flying colors. Fountain pen inks are a bit hit-and-miss depending on the ink. For example, Sailor Yama-dori performed extremely well, while Pilot Kon-peki and Franklin Christoph Midnight Emerald bled quite a bit and produced significant show-through on the page. If you pick the right pen/ink combo for this book, you'll be very happy.
The writing experience with all the pens I tried was very smooth. This is a good paper despite the tendency to bleed/feather with certain inks. It's a nice paper to write on, and it's also acid-free to ensure your marks will stick around a while.
Overall
This is a fun notebook that is both fun to look at and write in. Finding them for sale isn't as easy as other notebooks, but check them out if you're interested. The one I reviewed here is an A6 size, but there are several other sizes and colors available.
(This product was sent to The Pen Addict by Paper-Oh at no charge for review purposes.)
