Da Vinci Tomoe River paper inserts (aka I’m in love)

A while back, I mentioned that a friend had sent me some samples of Raymay Davinci paper (from JetPens) and I said that I was considering putting an order in to JetPens with him and we would split the postage costs. Well we did just that and I am finally getting around to reviewing some of it!

What did I order?

In personal size:

• A 100 sheet pack of 6.5mm lined paper
• 2x packs of the undated week to view inserts (30/pack, so I ordered enough to do a full year)
• My friend added a pack of plain paper to the order for me!

In pocket size:

• A 100 sheet pack of 5mm lined paper
• 2x packs of the undated week to view inserts (30/pack, so I ordered enough to do a full year)

(I know I am still utterly in love with the personal size de Villiers and indeed, wonder if I have reached planner peace with it, but just in case I get that yearning for the pocket size again, I thought I would avail myself of the gorgeous paper!!).

Over the weekend I went through the undated week to view pages and created my 2015 diary. The paper is just divine. I used my Parker italic nibbed pen with Diamine deep dark purple ink in it – a combination that Filofax paper would dissolve under – and there was NO feathering and NO bleed-through and the paper is ultra-thin. Filofax – if you made paper like this, I would buy it. But you don’t. Despite a zillion people asking for your diary paper to be at least as good as your white notepaper, you just ignore us. So instead, I have shipped this from the US! Yes, for those of us who want good paper, we will go to those lengths!

Here’s a double-spread to show you the layout. I know that some people might get bugged by there being Monday to Thursday on the left and Friday to Sunday on the right (most WO2P seem to split at Wednesday not Thursday) but you’ll see that Saturday and Sunday get the same size space and there is another box labelled memo. This little box is a godsend for me because (as you all know) I am pretty inept at turning a page, so this gives me space to alert me to things coming up early in the next week. If there isn’t anything all that exciting coming up, I can just use it for doodles or notes.

Davinci WO2P (in my navy Portland for storage)

The layout is beautifully simple. I never need those tiny-font, month calendar things at the top of the page, nor do I need a crash-course in 5 languages (that only teaches the days of the week). THIS is the kind of thing I need – a space to note the year, space for me to write the dates that the week spans, enough space for me to write the date next to the day, and unfussy fonts.

There is a bold green line across the top of the page and another at the bottom, then days of the week are printed in charcoal grey, except for Sunday which is in dark green. That bugs me a tiny bit, but not so much I’m having a hissy fit. The days are separated by a fine charcoal grey line.

Did I say the paper was ultra-thin?? I can’t emphasise enough HOW thin! I tried to take pictures of comparisons, but it was tricky. I counted out 52 sheets of cotton cream paper (assuming the Filofax cotton cream diary is printed on something the same thickness) and found a Filofax diary to try and compare the three sets. In this first photo, the Davinci paper is on the left and the Filofax diary is on the right. In the second picture, the cotton cream paper is on the left and the Davinci paper is on the right. Even with my terrible pictures, hopefully you can see the difference.

Full year in Davinci (l) and Filofax (r)

52 pages of cotton cream (l) and Davinci year (r)

The lined paper is going to be used for the weekly sheets that go at the front of my planner. I’ll only label them up when I’m using them. Incidentally, a nice (and very subtle) touch is that there are little marks on the top and bottom lines so that you can draw vertical lines easily on the page. They are definite enough to be useful but slight enough to be missed. Fabulous!

6.5 mm lined paper (in navy Portland for storage)

Teeny, tiny guide marks

Overall: five stars out of five!!!

Now, if only there was a UK supplier!! If anyone finds one, let me know??

SO many things to review!

I’m back!! And I have SO many things to review!

• Two RAKs
• Two new pens
• A stationery prize I won (yay!)

Today though, I will do RAK #1 where my good friend sent me some paper samples from an order he put in at Jet Pens.

He sent me:

• An old Filofax ‘letter planner’ insert
• Enough monthly inserts by Davinci for a year’s worth of planning
• A check list sample
• Some Raymay Davinci lined refill for personal size planners (6.5mm line spacing) and some plain paper

1. The old Filofax ‘letter planner’ insert
Interestingly, the top edge and inside edge look as if they have been torn from a perforated sheet – I don’t know if it was a larger sheet that was then separated, or why these edges look perforated. Anyway, I do have a ‘letters filofax’ (A5) and I do keep notes about things I have written to people (to try and stop repeating myself too much!) but I have never used a specific insert for this – I just jot notes on notepaper. I get the feeling that the letter planner insert was more for a business letter than for a personal one (I only really write personal ones!).

Front page

Reverse side

The top section has space for date, to, address, copies to, enclosures and file. Then there are two sections for ‘main points’ on the first side and three of these sections on the reverse side.
The copyright date for the insert is 2010 (somewhat surprisingly – I would have thought these would have been discontinued earlier than that...).

2. The monthly inserts by Davinci
These are printed on thin, cream paper (though my friend says that it isn’t on the Raymay Davinci paper, but from the fill from a binder he bought). It feels about the same thickness as Filofax diary paper (70 gsm?).

Undated monthly pages

The picture shows a double spread. The months are undated, with a quick 1-31 on the left hand side, then the days of the week across the top and six boxes deep on the left page and five boxes deep on the right, with the bottom space labelled ‘memo’.

3. Check list
Again, on thin, cream paper with grey and green inks. I don’t know what the Japanese symbols mean, but there are two check boxes on each box – one open and the other lightly shaded green. Personally, the boxes are too deep for me, but as there are two check boxes per large space, they could be divided into two. The depth of the box is 17mm.

Check list

4. Lined refill
Nice, simple design with a top margin of 9.5 mm, a bottom margin of 4.5 mm (with a bold line border) and lines at 6.5 mm spacing in a feint grey. The lines stop 9 mm from the inner edge and 5.5 mm from the outer edge.
The lined paper is the only one that I did a fountain pen test on. Oh, if only Filofax could make paper like this!! The paper is silky smooth to write on, with no feathering or spidering at all. And despite the paper being incredibly thin, there is almost no bleed-through to the reverse – a little, but certainly not so much (except with a Sharpie) that the reverse isn’t usable. The paper was a complete delight!

Fountain pen test - front

Fountain pen test - reverse

5. Plain paper refill
Um, not much to describe – same thinness that the lined paper has, and the same light cream colour. I haven’t fountain pen tested it, but I would be surprised if it was different from the lined paper.

Anyway, a HUGE thank you to my friend for sending me the samples and also for the offer of a combined order (to split the postage costs) – I may well be putting in an order for a lot of these beautiful papers!