u/MercatorLondon

Hi everyone,

I wanted to share a few photos and ask you about colours.

The first photos show the anodising in Burgundy, close to Tawny Port (19-1725 TCX Pantone). The images don’t really do the colour justice, as there is quite a lot of contrast going on.

Anodising is fun but also a bit of an alchemy and the colours can vary slightly from batch to batch. The colour intensity can change as the bath is used, and the dye tank gradually depletes over time. That is a manufacturing issue for us to worry about, though!

I am thinking about introducing some lighter colours as well to let the material itself shine through and do some of the heavy lifting here.

Are there any colours you would particularly like to see with this pen? We will run a small batches of different colours (around 6) as a test.

There is a small selection of colour options in the last image. I would love to hear what you think!

Previous post &gt;> here <<

Hi everyone,

I wanted to share a few photos and ask you about colours.

The first photos show the anodising in Burgundy, close to Tawny Port (19-1725 TCX Pantone). The images don’t really do the colour justice, as there is quite a lot of contrast going on.

Anodising is fun but also a bit of an alchemy and the colours can vary slightly from batch to batch. The colour intensity can change as the bath is used, and the dye tank gradually depletes over time. That is a manufacturing issue for us to worry about, though!

I am thinking about introducing some lighter colours as well to let the material itself shine through and do some of the heavy lifting here.

Are there any colours you would particularly like to see with this pen? We will run a small batches of different colours (around 6) as a test.

There is a small selection of colour options in the last image. I would love to hear what you think!

I wanted to try something a bit more interesting than the simple barley or diamond-machined patterns. Small repetitive patterns works best. This one will be etched.

The prototype will be laser-etched, as it’s relatively cheap and easy to produce a single sample this way.

If we decide to take this into a small production run, we will use chemical etching. That should give us better resolution and a cleaner look.

Those etched lines are deliberately kept fine but the pattern should still provide a reasonably good grip when writing.
Is this pattern too much for you? Would you go smaller?

As promised please find some photos of the prototype for the slim pocket pen.

The body is made of steel with a brushed finish. The cap is made of aluminium and will be anodised in a nice rich looking colour. This meant to be a colourful one!
The finish will be most likely satin finish to give it a nice contrast with steel. I expect the finished pieces to look very different once the final materials and finishes are applied.

I am also working on some textures for the grip section which I will share shortly.

Hi everyone,
I use SolidWorks to check all the tolerances and details before moving on to physical 3D prints or prototypes. This allows me to get the tolerances as close as possible to the desired level.

This is then followed by an engineer reviewing the model to make sure it is suitable for manufacture. Tolerances, wall thicknesses and machining steps all come into play when determining what is possible and at what cost to make it work.

Using a CNC lathe with a sliding head helps quite a lot with this. I hope to show you some metal prototypes tomorrow (no textures or colours yet)

Hi everyone,

I wanted to share some updated photos of the slim pocket pen. This version is somehow shorter than the previous print. Which makes it look thicker, but that is just an illusion. The grey resin is definitely killing the vibe.. I hope to anodise the cap in nice rich colour (the cap will be made of aluminium)

This pen will use nitrile rings instead of a screw thread and should be a more affordable small pen. Nitrile rings will also seal it perfectly. When folded, it will be just under 10 cm long. It will became full size pen when capped.

I am hoping to have a metal prototype made in a few days. We will be showing that prototype at the Top Drawer show in September - to get some more feedback.

(That black Tangier pen is there just to give you a better idea of the scale. You may notice the engraved texture on the cap - that was just a test to see what is possible in PMMA)

update: CAD models are here

When people think of Budapest's historic architecture, they usually imagine grand stone facades. But behind the heavy wooden gates lies a whole different ecosystem. These 19th-century apartment buildings feature central courtyards that have been transformed over decades into multi-layered gardens.

It's not just vertical ivy on the walls. As you scroll through the gallery, you'll see how these spaces have become actual micro-forests, filled with dense bushes, trees, ferns, and winding paths right in the middle of the urban hustle. They create beautiful, self-cooling microclimates during our increasingly hot summers.

I have selected 10 photos showing different styles of these hidden paradises—from lush vertical greenery to thick, park-like ground gardens.

This is an old map from the Desertec Consortium. It was an industrial initiative involving partners from the energy, industrial and financial sectors with the aim of building a sustainable energy network through the Trans-Mediterranean and European Renewable Energy Cooperation.

The plan was based on a mix of renewable sources, including solar, wind, geothermal energy and hydropower + interconnectors.

The initiative got some funding disagreements between members and eventually collapsed after the Arab Spring and the political instability that followed in several of its North African and Middle Eastern member countries.
Some parts of the project were finished (Ouarzazate Solar Power Station/Noor Solar in Morroco, Benban Solar Park in Egypt, Hassi R'Mel in Algeria and ELMEC interconnector between Tunisia and Italy.

The small red squares on the map show the approximate amount of land that would have been required to generate enough solar power to cover the energy needs of Europe (and World - if interconnected)

The required area is surprisingly small. With modern PV technology being considerably more efficient we would probably need only around half as much land today.

We had this technology available 20 years ago.

One with nature

Hi everyone.
Quick weekend project - I was playing around with some ideas for a simple display stand. This is just a rough sketch for now, so the proportions aren't quite there yet. Possibly in brass or steel.

But does this convey the idea of good balance?

The gas station designed by Atelier SAD comes with organic form canopy certainly stands out from a distance. The structure is based on three funnel-shaped columns made of concrete that merge with the three circular canopy disks. At their meeting end a ring of light sheds light below and pinpoints the gas stations location.

Hello designers,

New EU legislation is coming soon (in a week or two) and it will affect not only how products are packaged but also how they are labelled. The regulation will have a huge impact on packaging design, similar to the EU's right-to-repair and repairability requirements that will affect how products are designed and serviced. As a result, virtually every product sold in the EU will be affected. Most major companies have been preparing for these changes over the past two to three years.

I assumed that most designers had already read the legislation and were up to date. However, I have recently spoken with several designer friends who are blissfully unaware of these regulations and are trying to come up with their own approaches to sustainability and repairability... They heard about it but haven't read it in detail.

Where do you stand? Are you up to date? Have you read these documents and do you understand the requirements? I don't want to discuss the regulations itself. I just want to understand if you read it.

The exhibition pavilion of 1937 designed by Jaromir Krejcar is one of the most remarkable Czechoslovak pavilions at the world exhibitions. The pavilion consisted of a unique steel structure with a bulged glass wall – in the night the whole building was one big light and thus was a shining advertisement of the two top branches of Czechoslovak industry.

The pavilion for Czechoslovakia was located right at the base of the Eiffel Tower, next to Sweden's exhibition. The Exposition Internationale des Arts et Techniques dans la Vie Moderne in Paris ran for six months in 1937 and had over 31 million visitors.

The Czechoslovak pavilion, while small, is now considered to have been ahead of its time for its high-tech style using steel and glass. The whole building could light up at night, which was a novelty at the time.

And let's not forget to mention Pilsen-Urquell restaurant next to it.

So first off, let me state that the kind people at Thomas Slim ran a Reddit competition in August 2025 to select some beta testers and I lucked out. They shipped a pen over which got sent back from my home country so I then I asked them to send it to a relative in the UK who ended up misplacing it, only to find it and then ship it to me 11 months later! Despite that, the vendors were most patient with impeccable customer service and didn’t once message or inquire or in any way try to influence or pressure me for a review or an update and I’d like to commend them for that.

Now moving onto the pen: the packaging is unique and upscale. Unlike other pen boxes, this one is wider and flatter and I found out once I unboxed it that in addition to the pen, they included an additional nib unit with a Schmidt nib and 2 cartridges.

But what stuck out for me was the pen. It was elegant, timeless and sophisticated, and one can tell it has a brass lining for it is weighty and feels solid. The texture seems firmer and more robust than say, my Platinum 3776 or any of my Pilots. The weight was more than my Pelikan 605 or my Kaweco Dia2. All in all, I liked it and was pleasantly surprised at how premium it looked and felt.

The nib was another surprise. Developed in house, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Having used all manner of pens from Chinese (Jinhao, Majohn, Hongdian, Junlai, Asvine) to Japanese (Pilot/Sailor/Platinum) to European (Montblanc, Lamy, Faber Castell, Caran D’Ache, Kaweco, Pelikan, Parker), I was impressed. And I’m not saying that because I got the pen for free.

I genuinely enjoyed writing with this nib because it had character. It wasn’t trying to replicate any one experience but was making space for itself in my pen tray. It had a little feedback which I am partial to but was very very smooth overall. The feed fed ink wonderfully and I was really able to get going with this. I loved the way it felt in my hand and it genuinely felt a lot costlier than my Pelikan or Mont Blanc.

The one thing that threw me off was the way it turned counter clockwise but I suppose everyone needs a little eccentricity to define their character.

Overall, very impressed. I wouldn’t have heard about nor would I have ever really sought this brand out but after trying them, I will be following their updates to see where they end up and what other products they come out with. Not only was the customer service very accommodating but the packaging, the pen design, weight and execution all felt very premium. It writes better than many of my pens including my Lamy, Faber Castell and Parker and is a heavy contender to be in my rotation often.

Frankly, fountain pens aren’t exactly a mainstream market and obsessives like us keep this niche going unless you are a legacy company like Sailor or Faber-Castell. For a company to work hard to develop their own unique product and design as opposed to replicating 823s or Mont -Blanc designs is admirable and reflects the tenacity and nod to ingenuity and variety that make this hobby worthwhile. I wish Thomas Slim all the best in this market and hope to hear more from them in the next few years.

I am attaching some photographs to give you an idea of the packaging, the sizes (compared to a Pelikan m605, Pilot
custom 74, Sailor 1911L) and the way it writes. Check these guys out at r/penproject.

This former Nazi anti-aircraft bunker in Hamburg was converted into a hip hotel with a rooftop garden. The brutalist wartime fortress, which was deemed too massive to demolish, is now called the Reverb by Hard Rock Hamburg, a hotel with restaurants and a public rooftop park built above its 3.5-meter-thick concrete walls. The renovation, plus adding the extra five floors and the garden, cost €100 million. Before/after photos.

I’m sure this is one of those projects that gets posted a ton, but hey. Here we are.

German studio Ingenhoven Architects has completed a pair of skyscrapers, including Japan's tallest residential building, which are covered in planting on the lower levels.

Set on either side of Tokyo's tallest building – Toranomon Hills Tower designed by Japanese studio Nihon Sekkei – the pair of skyscrapers have a similar aesthetic, with one containing apartments and one office space.

The Toranomon Hills Tower, one of Tokyo’s tallest skyscrapers, is flanked by two impressive new companions: an office tower, 36 stories and 185 metres high, and a residential tower, Japan’s tallest residential skyscraper at 54 stories and 220 metres high. A green, publicly accessible plateau connects all three high-rise buildings at the first above-ground level. ingenhoven associates is the first German architectural firm since 1895 – since the headquarters of the Japanese Ministry of Justice by Berlin architects Hermann Ende and Wilhelm Böckmann – to build again in the Japanese capital.