Archive for July, 2009

Where to go: The North Sea Jazz festival

Posted July 14, 2009 by
in Where to Go? | Add your comment »

Our first international “Where to Go” entry! Thanks to Woodworker for writing in from the Netherlands… about Rotterdam’s North Sea Jazz festival.

Every year I go with a friend to the North Sea Jazz festival in Rotterdam (The Netherlands). This year I also took my wife for the first time. The North Sea Jazz festival is great because they have 15 places with concerts in one big building, filled with 25.000 people on friday, saturday and sunday. My wife was amazed about the huge amount of people. We saw several acts that blew us away. We started with Gilberto Santa Rosa, a latin band, woow that was a great intro. We went on to James Taylor, SMV (with Stanley Clarke, Marcus Miller and Victor Wooten, three of the greatest bassplayers).

Then came our Dutch champ Wouter Hamel. After that we had Amos Lee, George Duke. And last but certainly not the least was our own Candy Dulfer. She blew us totally away. Even when we where very tired, we could not stand or sit still, we just had to dance. It was great being in Rotterdam again. I hope next year we go again! If you like jazz/pop/blues and live-music, and you are in the Netherlands, just go there, it is a great festival with great atmosphere.

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Reminder: Win a free Clairefontaine notebook!

Posted July 13, 2009 by
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Don’t forget to enter July’s “Where to Go” contest! Tell us where you go and you could win a free Clairefontaine notebook.

Details are here.

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What’s the best way to view online art?

Posted July 10, 2009 by
in Pens, Paper & People | 8 comments »

paint

We just started working with Wet Paint Art in very cool pass-around project. Here’s the plan: we send them a Clairefontaine sketchpad, and they ask the artists that visit their store to draw, paint, watercolor, etc. on one of the pages. As each page is completed, Wet Paint Art sends us digital pictures of the work along with a bio of the artist, and we put it up online.

Question is, where do we share all this fabulous art with our fans? A Flickr group? Here? On a new blog that’s dedicated to the project?

Next question: if we were to pass around another art book—I imagine it would have to go through the mail, but who knows—would any of you like to participate?

Thanks!

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We’re on Facebook!

Posted July 9, 2009 by
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facebook

Ok, so we’ve been on Facebook for a while… I’m still playing around with it and figuring out apps and so on. (It would seem the business pages are much less flexible than personal profiles.)

The URL is not pretty—eventually, we’ll have to set up a redirect, cause we’re not yet eligible for one of those fancy new vanity URLs that everyone was talking about last month. Nonetheless, if you’re on Facebook, and you’re interested, please stop by and become a fan, start a discussion, or post something to our Wall!

Speaking of which… survey time, cause I don’t know the protocol: is it better to reproduce the first few lines of each blog post on our Wall, with a link to the full-text version in the Notes section, as it’s currently set up? (None of the other blogging apps I tried seemed to work very well.) Or would a Twitter-style update that simply announces each new post, and links to the blog, be better?

See you on Facebook!

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Some brave (and hungry) geese

Posted July 8, 2009 by
in Cabinet of Curiosities, Videos, Where to Go? | Add your comment »

As many of you know, I often go hiking on summer weekends near the NJ/NY border—lovely perk of having a car… A couple weeks ago, before heading out to Ramapo State Forest, we stopped by the Great Falls in Paterson, NJ. They didn’t disappoint: big cliffs, gushing water, and a footbridge that stretched out across them where you could take it all in.

What may have impressed me the most, however, were the Canada Geese that were standing quite literally at the top of the falls and pecking at the fish that went by. I don’t know how they managed not to get caught by the water’s momentum, but I’ve got the evidence on camera. Unfortunately, in my eagerness to capture the closeup I didn’t pull back to convey how tall the cliffs are and how fast the water’s moving, but there’s a still picture after the jump that should give you an idea. (Or you can check out one of these other videos of Paterson Falls.)

Continue reading »

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Tweets and Twibes

Posted July 7, 2009 by
in Pens, Paper & People | 5 comments »

twibe-theme

Quick question for all you Twitter users: are you a member of any Twibes? What do and don’t you like about them?

Karen and I recently noticed a Twibe for fountain pen users whose membership already includes a lot of people we know from our blog and our Twitter feed. We were also intrigued by the possibility of creating a Twibe around notebooks and paper. I guess those are two separate questions, but we’re not sure if either of them is something we should do—would it just start to seem like some cynical corporate thing? And are Twibes any better than hashtags for communicating about a specific topic?

If you have an opinion, please let us know in the comments (or on Twitter, which is where this question’s headed next). Thanks!

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Bastille Day Offer

Posted July 4, 2009 by
in Editorial, Pens, Paper & People | 23 comments »

In honor of Bastille Day (July 14th) we are offering our wonderful Quo Vadis Blog readers the opportunity to sample any J. Herbin blue or red ink of your choice!

july14th

See all J. Herbin inks here.

Blue inks include:  Bleu Azur, Bleu Pervenche, Bleu Myosotis, Eclat De Saphir, et Bleu Nuit.

Red inks include: Rouge Caroubier, Rouge Bourgogne, Rose Tendresse, Rose Cyclamen, Rouge Opera, et Rouille D’Ancre.

Please send us an message using the “Contact Us” form on the blog including your name, mailing address and your choice of ink.

Thank you for all your support.  Have a great summer!

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Montreal Meeting

Posted July 2, 2009 by
in Where to Go? | 9 comments »

The Quo Vadis North American meeting was held in Montreal, Quebec on June 4-5, 2009.  Before I left I asked readers of this blog to let me know any issues important to them to bring up for discussion at the meeting.  I did — and here are the results of your requests: northamerica

1. The Bahai’i holy days will be included in the 2012 planners.

2. We recommended to the designers in France that they investigate adding monthly calendars to the editions, and more space for Sundays. We also voiced the request to consider eliminating the activity designations in some editions so people can customize their planners to their own needs.

Since the agenda format is global, the activity dashboard will stay as it is for now.  However, future editions will include more space for Sundays, smaller holiday designations, thinner grid lines and more discreet fonts–giving people more room to write and a clean, harmonious layout.

Note: some editions already offer monthly planning, including Space 24 and Space 17.

3. The U.S. plans to incorporate a combination bookmark/elastic closure with most of its planners beginning in 2011. A ribbon bookmark will also be added to the bound Habana planners.

4. We expressed the fact that fountain pen users are one of our most important customer groups. We all agreed attention to papers selected for planners will continue to be rigorous.

In the interest of brand consistency, the U.S. expressed a willingness to change the paper on Habana notebooks from white to 85 g ivory paper in 2010. We will also investigate having blank as well as ruled pages, and developing a “corporate color” coverunique to the Habana.

Thank you all for your feedback.  We take very seriously the positive comments, suggestions and constructive criticism we receive on our planners and notebooks.  Since so much of your life is in your datebooks and notebooks, we constantly strive to make them responsive to your needs, as good tools and good companions.

Your comments and concerns are important to us and always welcome.

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