I just finished yet another Hanehmule travellers notebook and am averaging one every couple of months and have been using other notebooks for daily journaling. I would like to get back into bullet journaling but don’t want to waste my good paper so have been looking at cheaper alternatives and also experimenting with making my own.
We’ve been thinking of a trip to Japan who are known for their amazing stationary paper and calligraphy pens and ink. After a few days of going down the rabbit hole watching comparisons on YouTube and forums whilst looking after sick kids, I’ve concluded the tomoe river paper is the best for sheening ink in notebooks and am keen to try it. Tomoe river paper is not available directly and is instead used by third party providers in a range of different brands, some specialise in planners, printed paper. The two I found that have blank paper available are Midori and the Travellers Factory which have a range of notebooks in the travellers diary and passport size. The passport size is similar size to the A6 notebooks I’ve been using but slightly shorter. Book binders Design were having a sale and seemed to have the largest range of notebooks and paper that I was interested in trying.
My order from book binders design just arrived this week with a few different types of travellers notebooks – blank 003
– lightweight 005
– watercolour 015
– sketch 008
I also bought 2 blank paper pads from Midori – one is a blank md cream and blank white cotton
And also a crown mill 100% cotton A5 writing pad (50 sheets).
The travellers notebook lightweight 005 is the one that uses tomoe river paper and was amazed they managed to pack in a massive 80 pages for the same size as a normal blank 64 page book. It’s incredible.
The travellers notebook watercolour 015 which uses cotton Midori MD I was curious to try only has 20 pages but this is the same as my Hanhumule travellers notebook only shorter and cheaper.
The travellers notebook sketch book 008 was quite thick and paper quality seems comparable to the Hanhumule travellers notebook which is cellulose.
Sheening Ink test
I’ve did a quick ink test to compare the different papers using a sheening ink Van Dieman’s ink called parrot fish which is a beautiful light blue with pink sheening. I tested this out in a retractable calligraphy pen from Temu I was ready to throw out as I had a lot of issues with leaking , flow but after a clean out I managed to get it flowing. It’s good enough for this test and have my current Clairefontaine A6 notebook for comparison.
The travellers notebooks are slightly smaller than the A6 notebooks I’m used to using but love they come in a range of different papers. Even when compared to the pads they are all different thicknesses, feel and weight. Looking forward to testing them out with ink and watercolor but here’s an initial test with ink on the travellers
The watercolour paper and the sketch paper are much thicker so have little to no bleed through or shading. The thinner paper has shading but I think will be fine for me to write one both sides.
The watercolour test
Given these papers are designed for wet sheening ink I’m expecting that they will be able to hold up under watercolour but I’m curious to see how it will perform given the thinness of the paper with the lightest being 52gsm for the lightweight tomoe river and the heaviest is 100gsm for the crown mill . So far I’m quite impressed with how all the papers held up with ink and watercolour wash.
The Hanhumule travellers note book normally costs about $8 and there are a few stores I found in Australia online that sell the travellers notebooks and are about $6-8 AUD but have more pages. In Japan they are $2-3.50 AUD each so am testing to consider if it is worth stocking up if we make it there one day.
I can see the ultramarine granulation across all. This is in line with my expectation that the paper would perform well with sheening inks. There’s some buckling with the lighter paper – lightweight and blank. For sketching on the go it’s not ideal but not a deal breaker given its so cheap.
Overall the travellers notebook watercolor 015 performed the best. This cost $6.55 on discount with 20 pages it was 33c a page.
The next best by the 100% cotton crown mill paper. I’m quite happy with this and paid $24.95 for 50 sheets works out to be 48c a sheet. If I use this to bind my own A6 sketchbooks it’s 12c a sheet (ie counting the double sides). So for a normal 48 page notebook this is $5.76. Not bad for a high performing paper. It is 100gsm and you can see shading on the other side and also has a nice watermark which might be a problem for some.
I like this for smaller paintings or for inspirational quotes using with watercolor.
As a quick comparison I found a arches paper A5 pad online for $25.95 which has just 12 sheets. This works out to be $2.16 a page and if I were to use this to bind a A6 notebook it would cost 54c a page and use the whole 12 pages so cost $25.95 a notebook!
Calligraphy paper works out to be much cheaper more portable for the “sketch and wash” that I’m doing for (almost) daily life but is a notch better and cheaper than the current Hanhumule travel notebook I’ve been using and despite the great brand it is actually cellulose. I think I’ll be stocking up on the watercolour travellers notebooks given the price and quality! Also the lightweight paper for normal journalling as the quality and quantity 80 pages in such a small size! I can’t walk past. Will give the sketchbook a miss .. actually for the price it’s comparable to the hanhumule which has only 20 pages and it doesn’t show through to the other side but smoother and white and is 32 pages.
Midori MD paper pad comparison blank vs cotton
Now for the final two Midori MD blank and the 20% cotton see below for the results. Of course the 100% cotton won but in terms of suitability for a watercolor sketchbook all went well – the Midori MD blank was fine too.
Given the weight of the paper the paper I’m quite happy with the results. There was some buckling but not a lot. Bleed through was minimum and only the first one on the left (John 3:16) has bleed through. Though I think this is more to do with the fact I was using a fine tip fountain pen with sheening ink and attempting to do calligraphy so I went over the letters a number of times. This also unfortunately caused it to go over to the next page :(. Next time I will need to use a piece of cardboard to prevent this. I also drew the world first with the sheening ink but it was not waterproof so it dissolved too much when I did the wash over it. I think I can fix it up if I go over it again with ink.
The Midori MD notebooks are unique as they have a cutaway corner and also have gummed on two edges on the short and long edge. It’s like a pseudo half watercolor block with thinner paper. It’s great for sketching and watercolor painting. However you cannot paint too wet on this as even wet on dry the paper below also looked like it buckled.
If you prefer to paint wet I would recommend tearing off the page first and use masking tape to tape it down on a separate board. Additionally I don’t think this type of paper is suitable for reworking or scrubbing it’s more the ink and light wash.
I’ll have to test it out more to see if this is something I’ll continue to use for my regular travel sketch book. It’s definitely a more affordable option and now I have my shortlist for end of financial year sales and if I happen to go to Japan.
Aside I did also look into shipping from Japan but the costs to post was about $20+ for a small order hence the hugh pice difference for Japanese products in Australia. If you know of cheaper ways to buy this let me know in the comments!
Update the travellers and Midori notebooks are much cheaper in Japan! About 50% cheaper with most A6 passport size to be 330 yen (~$3.30 AUD) to 550 yen (~$5.50 AUD).
If you are travelling to Japan here’s my next post about Japan stationary haul!
And also how I use the notebooks when travelling
Japan travel notebook flip through and best bullet journal layouts for busy tourists
Rachel Fong Art 