C&W Pen Type-A

If Helen of Troy was the face that launch’d a thousand ships, this pen, for me, was the campaign that launched a hundred more pledges (and still going). Yes, this is very first project I backed from Kickstarter – so it was essentially my first foray into the world of crowdsourcing.

If it wasn’t for this pen, my first impression of Kickstarter could’ve gone on an entirely different direction – like those commenters you see screaming “I’M NEVER BACKING ANYTHING FROM KS AGAIN!” Instead, it turned me short of a KS hoarder πŸ˜›

It came in a pretty unassuming cardboard tube, but the content was another matter altogether: the pen and ruler/sleeve was machined out of pure stainless steel. This was all before I fell in love with Titanium.

The appeal was exactly as it was marketed as; MINIMALIST. Everything about this just seems to harken to the bauhaus principle of design.

You could also see and feel the care in how they built this thing through its tolerances – how the pen smoothly slides in, but because the gaps were incredibly small, it would slide in at a constant speed because of the air resistance. The same goes when pulling it out, there’s a satisfying pop as the pressure equalizes from the “vacuum” generated.

The engraving of the ruler indices also are so clean that you couldn’t even nitpick. You know how you usually get disappointed when you finally receive something and it wasn’t as good as you imagined it to be? Well, this is not one of those things πŸ™‚ It’s exactly as how they marketed it.

It takes in a very common Hi-Tec C refill 1 Which can be bought from any office supply shop, and obviously had a heft to it because of material used – but was still comfortable to write with. 2 Unfortunately I never tried writing at length with it since I’ve always been more of a digital guy.

The only drawback 3 Which I couldn’t really knock them for – since it was never intended to be portable is that, well, it isn’t portable πŸ˜› The ruler/sleeve is its cap – and it doesn’t have any detent to lock it into position. It was meant to be a desk piece that can proxy as a paper weight.

The other is not necessarily the pen’s fault. While Hi-Tec Cs write very well, they usually have to be “primed” 4 Writing a bit with it to make sure the ink starts flowing again… which results it skipping a few times on the early strokes after long storage – so whenever you use this you have to make sure it’s not going to skip on you by priming it.

You can purchase a Type-A at the CW&T website and curse your stars you didn’t back it when it was just a third of the price then πŸ˜›

Notes

Notes
1 Which can be bought from any office supply shop
2 Unfortunately I never tried writing at length with it since I’ve always been more of a digital guy.
3 Which I couldn’t really knock them for – since it was never intended to be portable
4 Writing a bit with it to make sure the ink starts flowing again… which results it skipping a few times on the early strokes

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