Ever since Dr. Shipman converted me to Moleskine notebooks many years ago during a climbing trip, I have coveted little black notebooks to record my thoughts, doodles, designs, to-do lists, etc… I drank the Kool-Aid and now I share a little “problem” with what seems to be a quarter of the world’s population: finding the perfect notebook.

The Moleskine was great for a couple of years, but they do not work great for fountain pens, the binding is lackluster, and I wanted some paper different options. Thus began my hunt for the perfect little black notebook. I have used Field Notes, Moleskine (pocket, large & cahiers), Blank Books, Knox-Japan (only sold in Japan and France), Pocket Blanks, Gallery Leather, Rhodia, Guildhall, No Names, Rite in the Rain, Piccadilly, Leuchtturm 1917, etc… Some have been great and some have come apart within weeks. I have fallen for the paper of the Rhodia and love the Leuchtturm format – dots, page numbers, and index. The Moleskine blank sketchbook has great paper, but not enough of it – I also keep busting the binding. The Leuchtturm’s paper will bleed a little, even when using an EF nib – as will most everything but the 90# Rhodia. The Gallery Leather has tear-off corners, but no page numbers and I can split the spine on a Webbook without even trying. In the last ten years I have come to decide that no one journal works for me for everything.  Here is my current quiver of little black notebooks:

Knox-Japan A5: calendar and work notes/design
Gallery Leather: pocket notebook
Leuchtturm or Rhodia A5 Dots: Travel Journal

I am still looking for a 90g, acid free, sewn binding 32-64 page A5 Cahiers for everything but my pocket notebook, which I would switch to a 3″X6″ sewn Cahier.  I would prefer to have single signature/section, using them up before they were utterly destroyed, and I would like to have the ability to bind then together if the mood were to ever strike.