This year the CLAS Festival of Calligraphy was held at Warwickshire College in Leamington Spa.

The CLAS Festival of Calligraphy gives everyone a chance to indulge in calligraphy and lettering. World class tutors teach a variety of courses in lettering. This year’s tutors were Mary Noble, Manny Ling, Ian Garrett, Lin Kerr, Clare Whittaker and Vivien Lunniss

The workshops take place during two 2 1/2 day sessions with Monday afternoon free.

We were delighted to be asked to attend Monday afternoon. As usual it is very hard to decide what Calligraphy equipment and materials to take to an event. We can’t take it all, and you guessed it we were asked for one type of nib, which we had left behind. Another dilemma we have is what quantities of stock to take. Thankfully we got this about right. We only sold out of three items and one of these we had limited stocks because the supplier is also out of stock.

It was great meeting lots of keen calligraphers in a relaxed environment. You could tell the calligraphers were really enjoying the Festival, because every single one of them who wrote us a cheque for payment could not remember what the date was!

Another method of preparing a nib is to use a naked flame. With this method, the nib is passed back and forth through a naked flame. I have tried this method and the results seem to be the same as using boiling water, so I have always stuck with that. However, the following email extracts prove it can be worth trying different ways.

Back in May, a customer contacted us with the ink flow problem. Attached to their email was some photographs that clearly showed the problem.

“I am attaching these pictures to illustrate my problem with this nib.
You sent me a Leonardt 33 nib. But, as you can see I can’t seem to write a single word.
I have ink on the nib but no flow at all. What am I not doing wrong? Any suggestion would be helpful.”

As the first photograph clearly shows, the ink was just sitting on the nib. You can see the tip of the nib is still dry. So we recommended the boiling water method. The following day we received an update.

“Unfortunately , it is not working for me. The nib cannot write at all.. despite the soaking.”

We then suggested the flame method. A couple of days later we receive another email and photograph. It had worked.

What I had learnt from this was that it is worth trying different methods on the same nib. Just because once in the past the flame method had been tried and the result had not appeared to be any different to the boiling water method I had not used it since. However, if one method does not work, try another.

We apologise for this inconvenience, but changing hosts will improve our service to you.

The Spencerian Study Group holds two major workshops a year in the City of York. Meetings are held at St Lawrence’s Hall, Lawrence Street, Walmgate, York. Fixed dates are the second Saturday in April and the last Saturday in September. Between times, members are encouraged to develop their penmanship skills by not only corresponding with others, but exploring creative ideas in a modern context from study day initiatives. Tools and materials are readily available through the group.

POSTAL MEMBERSHIP has now been running for two years for those enthusiasts interested in this period of penmanship yet for whatever reason are unable to attend study group meetings. Members receive the quarterly ‘Spencerian Review’ full of news, interesting articles and scans of original penmanship and calligraphy from the period. If you are at all interested in becoming a member of our postal group then please get in touch.

Brian G Walker

Download Spencerian Study Group information sheet for further details

They can be used to aid ruling-up including slope lines and as a guide to help keep your pen at the correct angle to the write-line.

Both a 45° and 60° Set Squares are useful.

However, the Adjustable Set Square (45°) is much more versatile.

Although it is a 45° Set Square, one side of the triangle is adjustable, so it combines the functions of set squares and a protractor. It can be adjusted and set to any angle between 0° and 90°

Adjustable Set Square

I thought I would follow this up by describing the way I practised Italic Minuscules. I don’t intend to explain how to write that style rather than my approach to practising the style.
The characteristics of Italics are different to those of Roman Capitals and Foundational Hand.

The nib is held at 45° to the write-line. So, I constructed a 45° line at the top left on my practise paper (I like to use Layout Paper). Next I ruled up the paper. It’s best to write large at first and at a later stage reduce the x-height. So I started with an x-height of about 15mm. The letters are also sloped at 5°, so I constructed a 5° line and then copied it across the page at 20mm intervals.

I was ready to begin; after loading the nib with ink, I hovered it over the 45° line to make sure the pen angle was correct. From experience I find that each practise session starts of badly – it takes a while to warm up. Then for a while you write at your best before starting to become tired and the letters become weaker. So at first I produce a few vertical and horizontal lines to get myself in the right frame of mind and to check the ink flow. It is important the nib is correctly inserted in to the penholder and the ink is flowing nicely. When practising, you do not want to be distracted with any nib and ink flow problems.

At this stage, the paper is ruled-up ready including your 5° slope lines and 45° pen angle line. Your nib and reservoir are correctly fitted and the ink is flowing nicely from nib. We are now ready to start writing …..

Italic Minuscules can be grouped together based upon similar characteristics. In this practise session I had already decided to practise the ‘O’ group of letters. It is difficult to get the consistency of these letters because they are all based on the oval shape. Getting the shape is not so bad, but to get the same width oval shape is hard. In contrast to this if you were studying Roman Capitals or the Foundational Hand you may be finding it really hard to get a perfect round circle, but at least you can visualise the shape. Visualising the correct width of the oval is a lot trickier.

Now warmed up and ready to go, I started by writing out a line of the letters c, e, o, l and t to get going. Next a complete line of the o letter was written. Then I looked carefully at my letters comparing them to the alphabet sampler and accompanying notes. Each letter was analysed and if I thought it was acceptable I placed a small tick next to the letter. If the letter was bad a small cross was made against it. At first there would be whole lines of letters with a cross against each of them. Several lines later a few more ticks started to appear.
This technique was then used with the other letters of the group.
Towards the end of the session I produced a couple of lines writing each letter of the group in turn.
By analysing and marking EACH letter written, quite quickly I found my work would improve. This method was used for each group of letters.

Finally, It’s a good idea to date your work and keep all the practise sheets for a while so at a later date you can go back through them and see how much progress you have made.

Before you start your practise think about what you want to achieve. It is far more productive to have an objective for the session; otherwise, you can easily end up writing loads but not really improving. Objectives for a practise could be; maintain a consistent pen angle, produce consistent straight vertical and horizontal pen strokes.

Once you have a good control of the pen you can then start practising the letters. With many styles of writing, letters can be grouped according to their characteristics. It is best to practise a group of letters in one session and a different group another time rather than writing out each letter of the alphabet.

If in one session you can see an improvement in one are you will be more satisfied with your progress. If you feel you are making progress you we will become more motivated and will want to practise more

Progress = motivation = progress

Please Join Our Mailing List and receive two FREE emails over a next few days giving you tips and advice on choosing equipment and getting started. ]]> http://www.scribblers.biz/blog/2010/06/join-our-mailing-list/feed/ 0 http://www.scribblers.biz/blog/2010/05/new-brause-penholders/ http://www.scribblers.biz/blog/2010/05/new-brause-penholders/#comments Thu, 20 May 2010 12:53:51 +0000 Scribblers http://www.scribblers.biz/blog/?p=682 We are now stocking two new Brause penholders

Brause Pupil’s Penholder

The Brause Pupil’s Penholder is a thin wooden barrell penholder with a metal end for attaching the nib. 155mm length. Ideal for the Brause Bandzug and Ornament nibs.

Brause Ergonomic Penholder

The Brause Ergonomic Penholder is a wooden ergonomic shaped penholder and is very comfortable to grip. 175mm length.

View all our Calligraphy Penholders