Nakaya
Nakaya Portable Cigar String Rolled Heki-tamenuri
Nakaya Portable Cigar String Rolled Heki-tamenuri
This is the smooth and slender Nakaya Portable Cigar. These pens are hand turned from solid rod stock, then lacquered with multiple layers contrasting colored natural resins.
String-wrapping is a highly developed craft with a centuries-old history in Japan, and Platinum, the parent company of Nakaya, created string-wrapped pens as far back as the 1930's and 40's. When utilized on hand-finished urushi ebonite pens such as the Portable Cigar String-Rolled in Heki-tamenuri seen here, the result is an object which is both a work of collaborative art in its own right, as well as an eminently practical and versatile writing instrument.
The double-slit Music nib is available at an added premium, as are plated and two-tone nibs.
Over time the greenish underlayer will become brighter on the Heki-tamenuri finish. The string wrapping complements the urushi.
The Portable Cigar is a full but not over-sized pen that will be a comfortable fit for most users.
Nakaya pens can be filled with bottled ink using the provided converter and can also use Platinum brand cartridges. Hand-painted Maki-e converters are also available. Nakaya's hand-painted Pen Pillows and Pen Stands are enjoyable add-ons with any clipless Cigar-style pen.
Nakaya's solid gold 14k nibs are well-suited to customizations including Stub, Cursive Italic, and Left Oblique, as well as the modification for added flex and John's noted Spencerian modification.
Unless requested otherwise, each pen or nib you purchase from us will be carefully examined, tested, and optimized for your personal writing characteristics before it ships.
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Customization Guide
Stub
 
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Above is the same size nib after a regrind to Stub. A regrind to Stub is often a good place to start for your first customization. Â A Stub nib provides broad down-strokes and narrow cross-strokes while writing, and is less position-sensitive on the paper than the crisper and slightly more demanding cursive italic.
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Cursive Italic
 
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More demanding, but also providing crisper edges and more line-width variation, is the very popular customization to Cursive Italic. This also provides broad down-strokes and narrow cross-strokes, but is also more position-sensitive in terms of how the pen is held and requires more skill on the part of the user. This is a common customization for artists and calligraphers, but is still smooth enough to make for a good everyday writer.
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Formal Italic
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Formal Italic is an even crisper and more demanding customization than either cursive italic or left oblique, and is usually utilized for calligraphy and by the most experienced users. This provides broad down-strokes and narrow cross-strokes, with even crisper corners and edges than a cursive italic - this is an extremely position-sensitive customization.
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Left Oblique
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 Commonly used for signatures and correspondence, the Left Oblique customization provides broad diagonal strokes and narrow cross-strokes, and like a cursive italic, is more position-sensitive and demanding than a stub. The whole pen must be rotated to the left in order to write smoothly, without skipping. The "Left" in Left Oblique refers to the cut of the nib itself, and does not refer to the handedness of the writer. |
Architect's Point (Also for Arabic and Hebraic writing)
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A more exotic regrind is that to Architect’s Point. Named after the style of writing used by Frank Lloyd Wright, this regrind is the opposite of cursive italic, and provides for broad cross-strokes and narrow down-strokes. This also tends to be a particularly useful customization for those practicing Arabic or Hebraic calligraphy. |
Spencerian
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Perhaps our most popular customization, but also one of the most advanced, the Mottishaw Spencerian Customization has gained special attention from being featured in a customer's YouTube video which has now received over twelve million views! The Spencerian starts from a semi-soft 14k nib and adds additional flex and a regrind to needlepoint to create a specialized writing point used for copperplate calligraphy. For more details, visit our special Spencerian page.. |