I never thought that I would have to stand in line at the checkout to get into a stock market featuring pens and stationery, but that’s exactly what I had to experience at Lurdy Ház, where the Budapest Pen Show was held for the third time this year.
With the HUF 3,000 adult ticket, you could see, touch and buy the products of nearly forty exhibitors and vendors, including Italian, Japanese and French fountain pens and stationery. The colored pens were lined up endlessly on dozens of tables, and it was hard to get to them because of the many interested people. “The demand for fountain pens is greater than we first thought,” summed up the state of the pen market by one of the dealers selling stationery and inks, and indeed: while last year more than six hundred people participated in the one-day event, this number was not less this year, seeing the interest.
“It’s not just ink in a tube, it’s self-expression,” said a representative of the well-known Italian pen brand OMAS, adding that a pen tells us what we want to show about ourselves. But not only the color and shape of the pen can be special, but also the way it is made. Most of the exhibited pens are made by hand, at one of the Hungarian vendors we were able to put together a pen we liked from the pre-laid out parts, and a German exhibitor assembled a writing instrument that was in bad condition on the spot, in the crossfire of worried looks.
These are jewels
– stated a visitor next to one of the tables selling Parker pens. For sure, they are permanent objects, and although today, in the digital age, writing with a fountain pen is more of a passion than an actual practicality, once someone has experienced what it’s like to write with them, it’s hard to go back to a plain store ballpoint pen.
The fact that a fountain pen is permanent is also proven by how much attention was given to when some pieces were made. At one table, I modestly examined an attractive burgundy pen, and the vendor complimented me, saying it was good taste for me to notice it. This is very rare in this color, he said. After that, I found out that the pen is from the fifties, has never been used, and is in original factory condition. Unfortunately, due to the HUF 85,000 price, I had to give it up.
At the exhibition, you could find pens for as little as seven thousand forints, especially those produced in the former Czechoslovakia in the seventies, but there were also plenty of pens for over one hundred thousand forints, for example, one with a fantasy name of Dostoevsky. The price depends on the brand, what it is made of, how many materials were used for the frame, and whether the nib is gold or silver. While checking the prices, I was told that the best ever pen, now considered a classic, is the Montblanc model 146 from the 1930s.
The HUF 85,000 fountain pen
Besides the pens, the other popular product was the pencil. It is good to write with them, they are of better quality, summed up the conclusion of a man selling pencil sets, who, according to him, has more than 20,000 pencils, but it is not so much collectors who buy from him, but rather people who actually use them. On the counters there are almost hundred-year-old, never-used products in store condition. He had a set of unopened colored pencils from the 60s, 70s, and also from the 50s. He identified a Rehbach pencil set from 1933 as the oldest.
It’s all like the car. If someone only uses it as a tool, he will not spend on a vintage car, stated a young participant. Not everyone has to be a fan of fountain pens. For those who are fans, this is a great meeting place: people with sparkling eyes showed each other their values and pride, and the whole thing – as if everyone knew each other from before – had an intimate atmosphere.
I was a little afraid of the stock market, because even though I write with a fountain pen, I couldn’t even imagine that such a thing existed, that is, that people would get together and spend a day with fountain pens, and that’s good. When I started out, I expected it to be absurd and boring and good for a funny story at most. But the treasures and the passion I encountered not only proved otherwise, but also made me look forward to next year’s occasion.
Opening image: Szilárd Makaró
