This week marks an amazing internet anniversary – the information rich pencil (and “disordered everyday occurrences”) blog Lexikaliker is ten years old! Congratulations!
Faber-Castell Polygrade pencils
As noted in this post at Lexikaliker, pencil industry leader Faber-Castell has issued a special set of pencils to honour the 200th birthday of Lothar von Faber. (An English language version of the product website is here).
To anyone interested in the history of pencils, this is super exciting!
This blog, nine years ago, was thinking ahead about tribute pencils for Faber-Castell’s 250th anniversary in 2011. Some good suggestions are in the comments.
This is what Faber-Castell produced. Beautiful. Every business must look forward, but I’d also hoped for a look back at their magnificent history.
Later than we hoped for, is this great set. The photos suggest it is very pleasing. Unfortunately, it is only available in Germany. I hope Faber-Castell will recognize the irony – Lothar von Faber created great success though approaching international markets. I hope this pencil set will become available internationally.
I also hope for the chance to contrast this set with the the original (a privilege to own).
Dave’s Mechanical Pencils, ZossPens, Pencil Pages
A few notes about some major online stationery presences:
Dave’s Mechanical Pencils appears offline. I’m not sure if this is a Google policy at work or David’s action, but it is sad to see it gone. It was the major English language mechanical pencil website for many years. There’s a small bit of Dave here, half of a joint blog post we did in 2009.
The Zoss Pens Listserv has announced the end. If you recall using Netscape or Mosaic – this list dates back to then. The list prided itself on being the most learned and thoughtful place to share fountain pen knowledge.
The Pencil Pages website is 21 years old! Congratulations Doug! The website used to have a “Buy/Sell” forum – it was the first online discussion of woodcase pencils that I became aware of.
I hope we can appreciate these efforts – each one involved a significant effort, and was shared freely with the world. Let’s carry on doing that, keeping conversations open and accessible.