#conway stewart pen

[syncallio]

A little simpler today: a Conway Stewart I picked up awhile back and had the worst time trying to fix the nib. Finally it writes!

I suppose I could have matched the denim blue of the pen with Diamine Denim ink, but I just got Troublemaker Milky Ocean and couldn't help myself. (It's so pretty!)

Conway Stewart is an English brand founded in 1905. The name has been bought and sold a few times, and the current version is made by Bespoke British Pens Ltd.

[petermorwood]

Happy birthday! If you could have any one authentic antique (weapon, armor, art, vehicle, anything, any era) for your birthday present, what would it be?

First thought would be the A.489 Swiss sabre from the Wallace Collection.

And then sense steps in, because - like all my other swords - this one is a bit limited. I'd get to own it, and polish it, and dust it, but since I don't do HEMA (Historical European Martial Arts) that's about the lot.

I might be able to take it to various places such as conventions, and bask in second-hand admiration - or I might end up having it seized by the police for (insert reason here).

So a much more practical birthday present would be a vintage Conway Stewart fountain pen, the one my Dad used to use. He wrote with that pen every workday for knocking on 40 years, and its (gold, flexible) nib became so attuned to his own handwriting quirks that he wouldn't let anyone else use it.

If you sometimes wonder why fountain-pen users are rather possessive about their oldest or most favourite pens, this is why.

@dduane is getting a bit that way about her Mont Blanc 146, which I bought her on a day when (1) she saw it, (2) she liked it and (3) I could afford it without hesitation all happened on the same afternoon.

I'm definitely that way about my Parker 51. I was given it on my first day of Big School in 1968, and since then it's written or signed essays, dissertations, examinations, the Official Secrets Act (twice - don't ask, it's a Secret), novel drafts, love letters and a marriage certificate.

I don't loan it to anyone.

The pen IS mightier than the sword. For one thing, it can go places a sword can't and for another, while a sword can kill a body only once, a pen can kill a reputation every time the disparaging comment it writes goes into print.

See Richard III of England for how well that works.

[stroodlenoodles]

It's time...for the Funger 1 Characters as fountain pens thread.

I did it for the Termina Crew so it's only fair I did the rest lol

Cahara is a Ranga Markandeya, the colour scheme reminds me of him

D'arce is an Excel Sterling, small but it's got weight (68 grams, that's heavier than a tennis ball! it's a pen!!)

Enki is a Faber-Castell Neo Slim because it's long and skinny just like him lol

Ragnvaldr is an Opus 88 Omar Eye Dropper, look how chunky it is!

The Girl is a Pilot Lady White Sakura Blossom, it's adorable!!

Le'garde is a Conway Stewart Shakespeare Sterling Silver, I needed something that looked pompous AND pretty haha

Nosramus is a Soennecken 111 Grey Herringbone Superior, for vibes

Celeste is a Maestro Oceanic White Mother of Pearl, thought it was fitting since she's a mom

And a bonus Nas'hrah....this random vintage Pelikan nib I found

Was gonna do the Fellowship gang and everyone else but I have no ideas so I guess this is it. Enjoy my goofy headcanons ;)

[whs-aesthetics]

The WHS Pen, produced by Conway Stewart (early 1900s)

[penhero]

A short article about this pen and its beautiful celluloid.

This a Conway Stewart Number 28 lever fill fountain pen with the eye catching Tiger’s Eye celluloid, c. 1949-1955. It's just over 5 inches long and has a pointed black cap top jewel and gold filled trim. The washer type clip has the Conway Stewart logo stamped at the top face and a diamond shaped tip. The lever tab is stamped with the Conway Stewart logo inside a diamond. The trim is bright but shows typical signs of light plating loss. The barrel is stamped Conway Stewart 28 over MADE IN ENGLAND. The 14 karat gold nib is stamped Conway over Stewart over 14CT GOLD over 5.

Read more about this interesting pen and its celluloid here:

https://www.penhero.com/PenGallery/ConwayStewart/ConwayStewartNo28TigersEye1949.htm

[goldenpr]

eve best + she/they + cis woman  –  have you seen renata barrows around los angeles? the fifty five year old is usually jamming to counting stars by one republic. word around the city is that they’re resourceful, yet, they can also be blunt, but you didn’t hear that from me. they’re currently a publicist and are typically seen walking the streets of los angeles with her conway stewart churchill classic black gold fountain pen. when i think of them, i think of perfectly tailored three piece suits, record player softly playing in the background, lipstick stain on the collar of a shirt. let’s hope the city treats them good! (marlene fei wanted connection)

BASICS

Name: Renata Barrows

Nickname(s): Ree, Ren

Marital status: "Married to her job"

Age: Fifty five

Occupation: Publicist for the Stars

Sexual Orientation: Lesbian

RELATIONSHIPS

Father:  Alexander Barrows

Mother:   Emily Barrows

Children: One daughter (technically her half sister but was adopted by Ren when she was a few months old.)

Romantic Interests: marlene fei (lover she has feelings for)

APPEARANCE

Height: 5'11"

Hair Colour: Blonde

Eye Colour: Brown

Dot points because brain no work

Runs her own PR Firm called "GoldenPR" she employees around 5 people.

Adopted her daughter 24 years ago. Biologically they are half siblings but her daughter doesn't know.

Has a bachelor of business (Public Relations)

Her father is her idol, her hero and honestly can't do anything wrong in her mind

Is absolutely head over heels for Marlene Fei but is afraid of what damage admitting her feelings could do to their relationship with each other and in the public eye

Tries to keep her head down in public and loves a good gossip.

More info (being added to)

Renata was born to young parents, barely 20 years old. Her father, a bright and up and coming actor during golden age Hollywood and her mother, an heiress to fashion label in Italy living in london. They married not for love but for what they could offer the other. Her birth was a surprise but not entirely unwanted. A child was a perfect prop in her mother's eyes. A living doll her mother could dress up and however she was the apple of her father's eye.

She was raised almost completely by her father and her nanny, only ever seeing her mother when it was convenient to her.

She has a Bachelor of Business (Public Relations)

For nearly 30 years Renata enjoyed the life of an only child, until her father had an affair with a younger actress. He asked her to take care of it and she did. She kept her father's name out of the press and had paid off the mother of the child to keep it silent.

not more than 6 months later, her father visited her home with a bundle of blankets. The mother having left her child with their father. They brainstormed ways to avoid her father being bad mouthed in the press and Ren came to the decision to adopt the child and raise them.

more tba

[petermorwood]

I was upstairs when I sent @dduane, downstairs, the link to the Conan Doyle version, and got a response that was audible right through the floor. :->

The people who buy these things will never fill them or write with them, they may not even dip them in ink to find out if they're smooth, scratchy, whatever. They'll just put them in a deposit box until enough time has passed that they can sell them on, "uninked", for a profit to someone else who will never fill them or...

*****

It's like owning a classic car and never taking it on the road, or even putting enough fuel in the tank to hear the engine turn over. Check out Jay Leno's Garage on YouTube to see how owning classic cars is really done.

I bet there are people who think the same way about fountain pens. They, of course, will be using proper classics from way back, made for writing with all day and every day - Waterman, Conklin, Parker, Mabie Todd, Onoto, Conway Stewart etc. - not something whose sole purpose is an investment that happens to be pen-shaped.

*****

Despite making pens and mechanical pencils since 1918 I'd never heard of Waldmann before this - which means nothing, there are lots of pen brands I've never heard of, but high-profile ones do cross my radar now and then if only to prompt the same thought: "Uh... Nope."

I was surprised that it uses the same cartridge / converter filling system as any cheap fountain pen - though after a moment's thought, the pen's never going to be closer to ink than the bottle it's packaged with, so how it's (not) filled doesn't matter.

It's probably the reason why a lot of very expensive production pens are also C/C. Why install a filling mechanism that'll never be used?

*****

Their fondness for 925 sterling silver as a material reminds me of Yard-O-Lead, which do the same thing, to the extent of dropping their non-silver "Retro" range a few years ago. Underneath the hand-decorated solid silver, Y-O-L pens are also just cartridge / converters.

IMO once a pen approaches the €-£-$ 1000 mark (many get interesting well before that, hello Lamy 2000) it should be a piston, or vacuum, or eyedropper, or side-lever, or plunger, or something more unusual than C/C.

Just because.

*****

Most of that silly price isn't the pen but the Conan Doyle / Agatha Christie document which is part of the package. Looking at the Waldmann website, a similar pen by itself would probably sell for about or under a grand (silver content keeps the cost up).

And for that or much, much less, the choice of pens to actually WRITE with - backed by lots of reviews about how they do - is far, far wider.

My Book of Wishful Thinking has a list... :->

In the words of my people:

...Yeah, no.

[rhysnolastname]

can’t watch movies because i will see a blurry fountain pen for 2 seconds in a transition shot and im like yeah that’s a conway stewart right there

[pastpens]

Alternative investment - EBay sell vintage collections

Alternative investment

quote from Fortune EBay wants to sell your grandmother’s vintage designer handbag as part of its growth strategy   Founded in 1995, eBay brought peer-to-peer online resale to the masses through its pioneering marketplace. But the e-commerce company has attracted an onslaught of competitors over the years. Nearly everyone, from mass retailers Walmart and Amazon to, more recently, specialized rivals like Vestiaire Collective and retailers like Michaels and David’s Bridal, is chipping away at its dominance. While eBay remains the largest online marketplace, with $74 billion worth of goods sold on its site in 2022 (and 1.7 billion listings), that volume was 15% below 2020. As a result, eBay CEO James Iannone, who conceded the site can’t just be an “everything” store, has focused eBay more sharply on a few core sectors, notably luxury.  We have our ebay shop since 2005; and got more than 6000+ feedback. For some of the luxury fountain pen collection please refer to our ebay shop and also our website. Here are some examples:    

pilot custom urushi black fountain pen

conway stewart medical sciences limited edition fountain pen box set cs084 leaflet

vintage parker lucky curve antique gold filigree overlay mother of pearl eyedropper fountain pen antique

vintage eversharp coronet golf fountain pen pencil set

vintage parker royal challenger sword clip silver herringbone senior fountain pen pk273

eversharp gold seal senior jade deluxe fountain pen new es025 Read the full article

[californiahq]

✧.* 𝑵𝑬𝑾 𝑹𝑬𝑺𝑰𝑫𝑬𝑵𝑻 ┛ . . . you're officially an angeleno now, jace ! welcome to los angeles, where the ocean meets the city, brunch is a religion and even traffic jams have their own instagram accounts. before you shine bright, take a peek at our checklist and send your account within the next 24 hours.

eve best as renata barrows .

eve best + she/they + cis woman  –  have you seen renata barrows around los angeles? the fifty five year old is usually jamming to counting stars by one republic. word around the city is that they’re resourceful, yet, they can also be blunt, but you didn’t hear that from me. they’re currently a publicist and are typically seen walking the streets of los angeles with her conway stewart churchill classic black gold fountain pen. when i think of them, i think of perfectly tailored three piece suits, record player softly playing in the background, lipstick stain on the collar of a shirt. let’s hope the city treats them good! ( jace / 25 / they/them / acst (changes in acdt in a week) / cancer, hospice, parental death, terminal illness) (marlene fei wanted connection)

[newtonpens]

Weekly workshop update, and ebay auctions

Hey all! It’s been a good busy week in the shop. Fixed up a Conway Stewart Churchill that had a couple broken bits- -and I just put up some more pens on ebay for auction, raising money for our scholarship fund.

[conwaystewart]

Best Luxury Rollerball Pen

Write with style and finesse with a Conway Stewart Rollerball Pen. These pens are made with premium materials and feature sleek designs, and are available in black or blue ink with a fine or medium nib. Perfect for any writing occasion, these pens are the perfect addition to any collection. Choose from a variety of colours and finishes to find the perfect pen for you. For more information https://conwaystewart.com/collections/rollerball 

[ink-pens]

The Turing-Welchman Pen

A limited edition of 211 pens to celebrate the achievement of Alan Turing and Gordon Welchman who created the Turing-Welchman Bombe machine used to break Enigma-enciphered messages during the Second World War.

The top of the pen is made in sterling silver to resemble the Bombe’s drum with the 26 letters of the alphabet etched into the surface. It rotates like the actual Bombe drum.

On the wide sterling silver cap band is the word “Victory”, the name of the first Bombe, and the UK hallmarks as a stamp of its quality.

Engraved on the barrel are the words “The Turing- Welchman Pen” to keep alive the memory of these most ingenious men whose secret activities during the Second World War helped save Europe from Nazi tyranny, and also triggered the start of the computer era.

And there is a secret compartment to hide your secret message – unscrew the barrel end, and there is a compartment to hold a small scroll of paper – your message to yourself, or to your loved one.

For more information visit Conway Stuart website.

[penhero]

Conway Stewart No. 22 Floral 1955-56

The Conway Stewart No. 22 Floral lever fill fountain pen is one of those pens that appears on many collectors “most wanted” list. Steve Hull notes in his book Fountain Pens for the Million, The History of Conway Stewart 1905-2005 that the pen was released to coincide with the company’s 1955 Golden Jubilee, having been founded fifty years earlier in 1905. It's noted for the design on the cap and barrel, decorated with red roses, yellow, and blue flowers on an ivory colored background. It’s just over 4 3/4 inches long and the cap band has a cut out pattern similar to a Greek Key design. There also was a controversy over how many of these pens were made.

Read the story about these interesting pens here:

https://www.penhero.com/PenGallery/ConwayStewart/ConwayStewartNo22Floral1955.htm

[spockri]

I’ve wanted to share this for a really long time, but I had to wait for my extra-fine nib to arrive from British Bespoke Pens to provide a writing sample.  I got this from the Kingsman pop-up shop during my trip to the UK. As a fountain pen collector, this limited edition pen by Conway Stewart was a must have item for me no matter the cost. I’m absolutely giddy that I got my hands on a Kingsman pen.  The iridium-tipped 18-karat gold nib writes like a dream. ‘Oxfords not Brogues’ is engraved on the gold cap band and the Kingsman logo is also on top of the cap. The only thing that’s missing is the little switch to activate the poison. 😁

[lgriffiths]

“someone once told me you have a fondness for maps. so i hope you’ll find your way in this world.

when you find that place, write to us, or about us, whatever comes first. happy birthday, liam.”

best wishes,

samir and evren.

(the neatly wrapped gift contains conway stewart ashmolean pen and a smith’s vintage map of london)