If your definition of a fine writing instrument is a plastic ballpoint with a smiling tooth and your dentist’s address printed along its side, then a visit to the Fountain Pen Hospital in Lower Manhattan might be revelatory.
In its quiet interior, away from the bustle of Broadway, you can browse and try any of the thousands of fountain, rollerball or high-end ballpoint pens behind its glass cases. That includes a classic fountain pen like the $935 Montblanc Meisterstück, with an elegant gold nib and a piston ink filler inside its black barrel. Or collector bait like the special-edition Krone, which, at $3,920, features a portrait of Benjamin Franklin and, in its cap, a piece of one of his lightning rods.
Or you can try the $55 Parker IM that writes so fluidly and precisely it seems capable of elevating not just your penmanship but also the thoughts you put on the page.
James Hutchinson, a salesman known as Jimmy at the store, described a fountain pen’s effect: “It slows you down. It makes you think about what you’re writing.”
The Fountain Pen Hospital represents a bygone idea in an age of instant communication, but it still draws people from across New York City to its storefront at 10 Warren Street. Terry and Steve Wiederlight, who are brothers and the current owners, have watched the business established by their grandfather and father in 1946 ebb and flow through the industry’s sea changes.
After ballpoints hit the mass market in the 1950s, the store expanded to all manner of office supplies. When big chains like Staples began to swallow up that business in the ’90s, the Wiederlights returned to their roots, selling and repairing pens from 40 brands, including Aurora, Dupont and Waterman, as well as vintage finds.
Most of their business is now through online sales, but they are among the last fountain pen sellers in the city that do repairs and carry replacement parts and ink. They remain a destination for pen connoisseurs.
On a recent Thursday morning, a gentleman came looking for a refill for his Caran d’Ache ballpoint. A doctor from Montreal bought a rollerball with a skeleton on it to delight his students back home.
Daniel Boggiano popped over from his office in the Woolworth Building to pick up four vintage pens the store had repaired. His wife had inherited them from a great-aunt who clearly had impeccable taste.
“They have a tremendous sentimental value to my wife,” he said, though the pens have little monetary worth.
Mr. Boggiano’s tastes run more modern — he likes an all-weather Benchmade or a vanishing point fountain pen — so he asked a salesman, Marvin Kujawski, to show him how to replace the ink in a marbled green, button-filler fountain pen Mr. Kujawski had identified as a Parker Challenger from the late ’30s.
“Very simple,” said Mr. Kujawski, 62, who has worked at the store for 23 years. “You press the button down, you put it in the ink and let it go.”
His partner behind the counter that day was Marilyn Brown, 83, who had owned a competitor to this store, Arthur Brown & Brother in Manhattan. She closed it almost four years ago because its monthly rent had become exorbitant, she said.
But Ms. Brown said retirement didn’t much suit her. “I called Terry and said, ‘How would you like a part timer?’”
To attract the younger generations, Ms. Brown contends, stores like this one must convey the message that a pen is also a mark of style. When a person at a meeting “unscrews the top of a fountain pen,” she said, “everyone looks to see what he’s doing; that puts him one step above.”
(Source: NYT)
In its quiet interior, away from the bustle of Broadway, you can browse and try any of the thousands of fountain, rollerball or high-end ballpoint pens behind its glass cases. That includes a classic fountain pen like the $935 Montblanc Meisterstück, with an elegant gold nib and a piston ink filler inside its black barrel. Or collector bait like the special-edition Krone, which, at $3,920, features a portrait of Benjamin Franklin and, in its cap, a piece of one of his lightning rods.
Or you can try the $55 Parker IM that writes so fluidly and precisely it seems capable of elevating not just your penmanship but also the thoughts you put on the page.
James Hutchinson, a salesman known as Jimmy at the store, described a fountain pen’s effect: “It slows you down. It makes you think about what you’re writing.”
The Fountain Pen Hospital represents a bygone idea in an age of instant communication, but it still draws people from across New York City to its storefront at 10 Warren Street. Terry and Steve Wiederlight, who are brothers and the current owners, have watched the business established by their grandfather and father in 1946 ebb and flow through the industry’s sea changes.
After ballpoints hit the mass market in the 1950s, the store expanded to all manner of office supplies. When big chains like Staples began to swallow up that business in the ’90s, the Wiederlights returned to their roots, selling and repairing pens from 40 brands, including Aurora, Dupont and Waterman, as well as vintage finds.
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| Jimmy Hutchinson, right, an employee of the Fountain Pen Hospital, and a customer examine a fountain pen. The store is on Warren Street in Lower Manhattan. |
Most of their business is now through online sales, but they are among the last fountain pen sellers in the city that do repairs and carry replacement parts and ink. They remain a destination for pen connoisseurs.
On a recent Thursday morning, a gentleman came looking for a refill for his Caran d’Ache ballpoint. A doctor from Montreal bought a rollerball with a skeleton on it to delight his students back home.
Daniel Boggiano popped over from his office in the Woolworth Building to pick up four vintage pens the store had repaired. His wife had inherited them from a great-aunt who clearly had impeccable taste.
“They have a tremendous sentimental value to my wife,” he said, though the pens have little monetary worth.
Mr. Boggiano’s tastes run more modern — he likes an all-weather Benchmade or a vanishing point fountain pen — so he asked a salesman, Marvin Kujawski, to show him how to replace the ink in a marbled green, button-filler fountain pen Mr. Kujawski had identified as a Parker Challenger from the late ’30s.
“Very simple,” said Mr. Kujawski, 62, who has worked at the store for 23 years. “You press the button down, you put it in the ink and let it go.”
His partner behind the counter that day was Marilyn Brown, 83, who had owned a competitor to this store, Arthur Brown & Brother in Manhattan. She closed it almost four years ago because its monthly rent had become exorbitant, she said.
But Ms. Brown said retirement didn’t much suit her. “I called Terry and said, ‘How would you like a part timer?’”
To attract the younger generations, Ms. Brown contends, stores like this one must convey the message that a pen is also a mark of style. When a person at a meeting “unscrews the top of a fountain pen,” she said, “everyone looks to see what he’s doing; that puts him one step above.”
(Source: NYT)
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