We love stationery! Blogposts weekly every Friday and free printable monthly.

Friday, March 31, 2023

Friday, March 24, 2023

Review: DAISO MT X Dagashi Masking Tape

Popular Japanese 100yen store DAISO has released a masking tape collection with a DAGASHI theme. Dagashi are cheap retro sweets popular amongst both children and adults. The tape is made by THE iconic masking tape maker MT as well.

Here are two we picked up
The packaging illustration is extremely cute.

Here is how it looks like unrolled.

Since its mt tape, the quality is very much assured. Both in print quality and how well it sticks/removes. The designs are whimsical and if you are a fan of dagashi, you cannot miss out on getting it ^^
And being from DAISO, the price point cannot be beat either!

Hope DAISO will carry more mt tape!



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Sunday, March 19, 2023

Review: Pilot ILMILY highlighter in Night Sakura

 


I love my highlighters. 

Contrary to popular belief, they're a very versatile writing tool. 

Stationery brands agree, and here we have the ILMILY color two color highlighter by pilot. 
The ILMILY line of pens also includes a ballpen, both products are colour changing. 
There is a primary colour that you write/highlight with and you apply friction with a rubber tip at the other end of the pen to change the colour of the ink. 


I purchased the highlighter in the colour 'Night Sakura'. 

The primary colour being 'Night', a midnight blue and the colour changer being 'Sakura', which is of course, pink!

The night colour is too dark to highlight text but is great for adding colour to a page, the sakura colour is a nice accent. 



Unfortunately, because the friction required is quite a lot, it was difficult to draw shapes using the rubber end. Straight lines are easier and produce a better result. 

Other than minor detail, the night sakura version of the ILMILY line is really nice. 
I'm impressed that the colours are both quite different but they compliment each other and produce a nice effect. 

I'll definitely look out for more of these pens. 




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Friday, March 10, 2023

Review: Notebooks from Standard Products by Daiso

 


Standard Products is a spin off brand from Daiso. 
 The brand's philosophy is "A little nice, goes the extra mile" 

Items are well designed, minimalist and clean looking but still affordable. 

I picked these notebooks up during my first visit to a Standard Products store. 

On the left is the ash notepad, it's A7 sized, 80 sheets of white paper in a 5mm grid layout
The other is a gray notebook, A6 sized, 64 sheets of cream paper in a 7mm ruled layout. 


The ash notepad is a great size for casual notetaking.

I was surprised by the paper quality, it feels coated and it's very smooth. 

The cream paper in the notebook feels reminiscent of Midori's cream paper but of course, Midori's paper can't be beat. 

Both the grid and ruled layouts are very functional, the printing is light but visible. 


Design wise, I think they are very pretty, they would look great even as table decoration. 

My only gripe is that the cover design on the notebook is a slipcover and I would've liked it if it was printed on instead. 

In conclusion, these notebooks are very affordable. So if you're looking for an aesthetic simple notebook/notepad, I recommend going to Standard Products and picking these up! 

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Friday, March 3, 2023

Review: Hobonichi Techo X Deco Rush

Here at TN5C we love the DECO Rush range so when we found out Hobonichi Techo had launched a collaboration with them, we had to check them out!

Here's the one we picked up

There are 7 in the collection [all limited edition]
Like the usual Deco Rush, they feature a sleek neutral tone cardboard packaging 

Here are the swatches

And they will fit right in with the usual Deco Rush, making it easy to store.

What do you think of them?
Have you checked them out?

 

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Friday, February 24, 2023

Friday, February 17, 2023

Review: Sanby Nicoma Stamp

 


Something a bit different today. 

I picked up this interesting stamp. 
It's a Nicoma stamp by Sanby 

The premise of the Nicoma stamp is that you can use it on a memo, a small letter, but hiding part of the illustration, you're giving the receiver a surprise! 


I picked this illustration of a girl with ramen hair, how cute! 

The stamp inked and stamped well. 


I wrote my message. 


and surprise! It's hair not ramen. 

How cute is this? 

Check out their other designs here.

What do you think? Is it cute? Quirky? Would you buy one? 

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Friday, February 10, 2023

Review: MIDORI 2023 MD Calendar Weekly

We are a month into 2023 and I have been using my new diary calendar from Midori. So I figured it was a good time to post a review!
MIDORI 2023 MD Calendar Weekly

Weekly View

You are able to stand it up for easy viewing.


Includes memo pages

As you would expect, every page is made with MIDORI's signature MD paper which we here at TN5C are HUGE fans of. It writes smoothly and does not allow pen ink to bleed through.

What do you think? Would you try it out?

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Friday, February 3, 2023

Review: Made of Tomorrow Notepad

 


Usually we blog about things we've purchased ourselves but today, I wanted to talk about this notepad I received as a gift. 

It's by a New Zealand brand called 'Made of Tomorrow', they make functional homewares and stationery and it's all made in New Zealand.

The notepad is a part of their paper goods lineup, it's 19 x 9cm, gold foil embossed cover and has 52 pages of 120gsm paper.

Having a look at their website, you can get it monogrammed too! 



Opening the notepad up, you get this page with their sustainability information. 
The illustrations are cute and I appreciated that it's made with recycled materials! 

Also good to note is that the notepads have no plastic laminate coating and 100% recyclable. 



The 52 pages are 1/2 blank and 1/2 lined which I feel is pretty unique.
I like lined sometimes, blank sometimes so it suits my use pretty well. 


I also think it's great the paper is 120gsm, oftentimes you get notebooks that have paper that is way too thin. 

The 120gsm here works well with the sign and brush pens as well as regular pens, no bleed and it's pretty smooth. It's no midori paper but I think it's better than most other notepads I've tried. 

If you're in New Zealand and happen to see this brand, you should check it out! 

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Friday, January 27, 2023

Friday, January 20, 2023

Review: Pentel Fudehajime, Brush pen for beginners

 


My brush calligraphy skills are still very lacking but I do enjoy buying different brush pens. 

The Fudehajime from Pentel is specifically for beginners. 

I picked up the pen in black and pale black ink colours. 


Pale black is almost grey, it has a watercolour like quality to it whilst the black is very pigmented.
The ink is also quick drying and it is recommend that you use paper for inkjet printers. 
I thought that was great as not everyone will have special calligraphy paper and so the pen can be used by anyone.

As a bonus, the pen cap works great as a pen rest. 


What makes the Fudehajime a beginner pen?

The length of the brush is the best for beginner level users.
A longer brush is for intermediate to pro level calligraphists.
It is also harder than a regular calligraphy brush pen, which means better control.  


As mentioned previously, the pale black ink is watercolour like.
It's not my favourite unfortunately. 

The pen itself is really easy to use, the brush is not too soft, not too hard and easy to control, which I really appreciated. 


The black ink is really nice on paper, I definitely prefer this to the pale black. 


The pen designs are also really pretty, they are based on traditional Japanese art.

Overall, if you're looking into getting into brush pens/calligraphy, this will be a good pen to pick up. 

Fudehajime, Fude means brush, hajime means first/beginning and it really lives up to it's name. 

What do you think? Would you try this out? 

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Friday, December 30, 2022

Friday, December 23, 2022

Review: Yamato Clip Memo Tape + Magnet


It’s fusen time again. 
Feels like it’s been awhile since we’ve done a fusen review! 

This time, I would like to introduce the Clip Memo Tape + Magnet by Yamato

The Clip Memo Tape + Magnet is an improved version of the Fuse’n’Tape
It adds a clip and magnet and now comes in pastel colours. 


I purchased this fusen in yellow, it reminds me of the classic post it notes. 
The roll is 15mm wide and 10m long and fully self adhesive, like other fusen, it is movable. 
The dispenser has a clip on one side, a magnet on the other side and a paper cutter on the end. 

The clip is unfortunately a bit thicker than the usual paperclip, most likely to hold up the weight of the fusen roll but it does clip on nicely onto a notebook cover.
But again, the weight does not make it very practical. 


The paper material used is nice and thick and the paper cutter cuts the paper roll easily.
I really like the jagged edges, it looks like washi tape. 


I decorated some strips of fusen that I cut. 
I used highlighter pens here and I think it looks pretty good. 
And because the material is paper, not film, most general pens will work. 


The yellow really stands out on white notebook paper, great for marking stuff and other important uses.

Also, did I mention it won the Good Design award for 2020? 

What do you think? Is this something you would find useful? 







 

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