I’ve had my old Roterfaden for a little while now and it’s been a couple of months since I published my review here. One thing about writing a review of something like this is that it really gets you thinking about how you’re using it. That, combined with a new iPad mini and the arrival of some refills very kindly sent to me by Roterfaden, led to some new thinking about how I’ve got it set up.

I tried a several variations and have ended up with this.

The iPad lives in the front pocket. I tried it in the back, where it’s really meant to go, but that meant either not using the Rhodia notepad or putting it at the front. I missed the paper too much when I used something else and it didn’t work for me in the front because, being right handed, I need it to be on the right side of the notebook when I’m writing in it.

This means iPad in the front and Rhodia notepad still in the back.

The cover for the iPad slips nicely into the plastic wallet. I’d tried the Roterfaden plastic wallet but it didn’t really work for me as the opening is at the top and it doesn’t zip up. I now have a Midori plastic wallet in the Roterfaden (fortunately it caused no adverse chemical reaction) and it works really well. I keep my ruler and suchlike in the zipped up part. (I am a Maths teacher by training, old habits die hard.)

The Roterfaden refills are all made from recycled paper. It’s a slight off-white and quite fountain pen friendly. I prefer the crisp smooth white paper of the Rhodia notepad but keep the plain paper refill in here for sketches and mind maps and that kind of thing.

The Leuchtturm Whitelines notebook I was using at the time of the review served me well and I used it until the end of term (mid-July). It wasn’t ideal though. The paper wasn’t all that kind to fountain pens but I did find something that worked for me (a Pilot Vanishing Point, broad nib, Pilot Iroshizuku Kon-Peki ink). As many people noticed, the hard cover did make the whole set up rather podgy.

What I really wanted was a soft cover A5 thick notebook, plain or grid lined, with fountain pen friendly paper. Although the TWSBI notebook seemed to meet these criteria I’d kept away from it as reviews have tended to be quite negative. I thought I’d try, though, and, although I’ll do a full review one day, it’s safe to say I’m very happy with it. It’s just what I wanted, in fact.

So that’s my current setup. What isn’t pictured is my Pilot VP, which lives in the pen loop. This pen is perfect for work but as I’m on my summer holidays now it’s in storage until the new term.

It’s quite likely that now I’ve written this up I’ll change things around again but, for now, it suits me very well.