One of my all-time favorite blog article topics is Sailor fountain pens. Even before I bought a Sailor of my own, I loved taking photos of Sailors and writing about what makes each one special and unique. Sailors just make me happy, so I always look forward to adding another chapter to my "So Many Sailors! Navigating the Colorful Waters of Sailor Pens" series. I started this saga back in March, 2022 (wow!), because I wanted to feature some of the older releases you may have missed over the past few years. So far, I've written two follow-up episodes, and this will be the fourth. You can still read Part One, Part Two, and Part Three, and many of the retired Sailors from my previous three articles are currently 40% off for Sailor North America’s “Don’t Miss The Boat” Sales Event. Every pen I chose for this new article is also part of the sale. Prices will go back to normal on October 1st, so, if you've been eyeing a Sailor, now is the perfect opportunity to take the plunge. Hopefully I can help you choose!
Six More Sailors
For this installment of the saga, I decided to feature (top to bottom in my sunny photo): Trinity, Storm Over the Ocean, Sailor's Pen of the Year 2022 (Soda Pop Blue), Mexican Screwdriver, Stormy Sea, and Metallic Purple. I'll talk about why I love these six pens individually below, but first I just wanted to show you how pretty they are together in my pen tray in the late afternoon sunlight. Many pens can look very different depending on the lighting they are in, and I was astonished when I first saw a couple of these in direct sun. Storm Over the Ocean is actually extremely sparkly in bright sun, but I'll talk more about that later!
Quick Recap, Sale List, and Warning
It's been over a year since my last "So Many Sailors...!" episode, so you might want to refresh your memory with a quick recap of my Sailor Model Summary where I talk about pen shapes, sizes, and nibs. For a very in-depth discussion of Sailor models and nibs, refer back to my more recent article on Getting to Know Sailor Nibs from July. In that article, I compared the Professional Gear Slim Mini, Pro Gear Slim, Pro Gear Standard, Pro Gear King of Pens, 1911S, 1911L, 1911 King of Pens, and all possible sixteen nib sizes.
Just be aware, we have very limited remaining stock of some of these discontinued designs, and can't order any more from Sailor, so, even though the pen may have originally come in a wider variety of nib choices, we may only have one or two left. If you see one you love that's still available, act quickly.
Here's a list of all the "Don't Miss the Boat" sale models that we still have right now. It's pretty long!
- 4 A.M.: 1911S and 1911L - featured in Part One
- Key Lime: 1911S and 1911L - featured in Part Two
- Loch Ness Monster: 1911S and 1911L - featured in Part One
- Royal Tangerine: 1911S and 1911L - featured in Part Three
- Stormy Sea 1911S and 1911L - featured in this article
- Trinity: 1911S and 1911L - featured in this article
- Bora Bora Waters Professional Gear (standard size)- featured in Part Two. This is our store exclusive!
- Fire Professional Gear: standard and King of Pen - featured in Part Three
- Go USA Professional Gear: slim
- Pillow Book - Autumn Sky Professional Gear: slim and standard - featured in Part Two
- Storm Over The Ocean Professional Gear: slim, standard and King of Pen -featured in this article
- Sunset Over the Ocean Professional Gear: slim, standard, and King of Pen - featured in Part One
- Too Hot Habanero Professional Gear: slim and standard - featured in Part Two
- Pen of the Year 2022 (Soda Pop Blue) Professional Gear: slim and standard - featured in this article
- Blue Margarita Cocktail Cantina Professional Gear (standard size)
- Mexican Screwdriver Cantina Professional Gear (standard size) - featured in this article
- LINE FRIENDS SALLY Professional Gear Slim
- LINE FRIENDS BROWN Professional Gear Slim
- Metallic Blue Professional Gear Slim
- Metallic Purple Professional Gear Slim - featured in this article
- Transparent Orange Professional Gear Slim
- Transparent Pink Professional Gear Slim
- Transparent Green Professional Gear Slim
- Ivory/Silver Professional Gear (standard size) - featured in Part Three
- Orange/Silver Professional Gear (standard size)
- Black/Silver Professional Gear II Slim. Has a beautiful two-tone nib and is the only pen in our case featuring Sailor's very cool anchor-style clip design!
- Taupe Professional Gear Slim Mini (“Sapporo Mini”). We only have one left in this cool style with the cap that screws on to post!
- Maki-E Endangered Mammals Fountain Pen - Bengal Tiger and African Elephant.
- Luminous Shadow King of Pen (Bespoke Dealer Exclusive) - Grove Green, Storm Blue, and Dusk Red. These are actually 47% off. This limited edition was limited to 300 pieces worldwide. Original price $1,100, on sale for $580.
The list started out even longer, but many have sold out already!
Storm Over the Ocean
This pen blew my mind yesterday when I saw it in a patch of sun on my dining room table, so I want to talk about it first. I always thought Storm Over the Ocean was a fascinating liminal shade between purple and blue. The end finials are what Sailor describes as an "electric lilac," but the body of the pen is ambiguous. The color has an intriguing luminosity that I didn't realize at first is from Sailor's softly sparkling "metashine"--very tiny shimmer particles that catch the light and give the material an amazing depth and beauty.
The effect can be very subtle, depending on lighting, or can knock you over with its glittery glamor. It reminds me of walking outside and seeing certain rocks come to life with sparkling brilliance in the low late-afternoon sun.
As you can see, the color of the pen also changes dramatically in bright sun! The transformation can't be fully captured in still photos because the particles constantly shimmer and throw off ever-changing light as you move the pen, but what looks like a fairly conservative pen in low-lighting turns into a glam disco pen as it moves through the sun! I posted a video of this on my Instagram.
Sailor describes Storm Over the Ocean as "the pen of choice for any brainstorming session or late-night reflection," a suggestion that really appeals to me, as I love brainstorming creative ideas with Leila at work, as well as getting inspired alone late at night.
Here's Sailor's description of their concept of the Storm Over the Ocean pen:
A distant lightning storm upon the wild ocean would be a brilliant event for any sailor to see. This striking natural phenomenon has been captured in a glimmering deep ocean blue complimented by an electric lilac highlight on both finials in Sailor’s newest Professional Gear release: Storm Over the Ocean (Umi No Arashi). The way light plays off of the deep blue color with the softly sparkling metashine is like the brief reflection of lightning on the ocean waves, while the lilac accents bring out the vividness of the sky after a flash.
I paired a broad nib standard-sized Storm Over the Ocean with Sailor Shikiori Nioi-sumire ink, and I think it's a perfect match!
This pen was released in all three sizes: slim, standard, and King of Pen, and we were able to get some more for the Don't Miss the Boat sale, so we still have a few left in each size, even King of Pen!
Sailor Pen of the Year 2022 - Soda Pop Blue
I remember when Sailor's 2022 Pen of the Year came out. Leena's daughter Shriya and her friend Winnie were seniors in high school and were both working in sales at the store, and they kept repeating the pen's name, "Soda Pop," together in a completely silly and adorable way. For me, the pen immediately evokes summery vibes and memories of fun, laughter, and the girls' bubbly personalities. What were you doing in 2022? Do you want to commemorate that year with a feel-good demonstrator pen in a gorgeous shade of vivid aqua? This limited edition Professional Gear "features a whimsical, translucent topaz color with silver glitter suspended throughout the body and cap." The effect perfectly captures the effervescence of a tall, cold glass of soda and has a youthful, uplifting look that can't help but make you smile.
Sailor says this pen "brings to mind summer days spent splashing by the pool, dipping your toes into the water and your Sailor Professional Gear Pen of the Year 2022 – Soda Pop Blue into your favorite bottle of ink." I love this image! One of my favorite bottles of ink is Waterman Inspired Blue, which I think is an inspired pairing.
Highlights of the Sailor Professional Gear Pen of the Year 2022:
- Bicolor solid gold Sailor nib. 14K for Professional Gear Slim and 21K for Professional Gear Standard
- Available in nib sizes EF, F, MF, M, B, Z and MS
- “2022” engraved into the gold-plated cap band
- Limited edition
- Exclusively available in North America and only through Authorized Sailor Pen North American Retailers
- Not available in other countries, not even Japan
Trinity
The Trinity 1911 (available in both the slim and large sizes) has a dramatically different feel than either of the first two pens. This pen was clearly inspired by the groundbreaking film series The Matrix, and captures the effortless cool of Carrie-Anne Moss' character Trinity. As Sailor writes, it was "more than fate that brought this modern North American exclusive to you[;] it was written into the code. 'Trinity' is elegant and powerful, a renegade amongst other black pens."
Each pen comes with a classy, clear Acrylic Sailor Pen Rest, and a small notice tucked under the clip explaining, "Please note the nib of this pen is specially ion-plated to give the unique color. Only Sailor inks should be used with the pen to avoid damage to the nib plating." Accordingly, I chose a Sailor ink to pair with Trinity, and now I'm obsessed with Ink Studio 723, a very deep purple that is close to black. Just look at that sophistication and sheen! It's hard to capture in a photo, but the electric green sheen shows up on the downstrokes of the letters, too.
Stormy Sea
I've already talked about my obsession with the Stormy Sea 1911 in other blog articles, but never featured it in "So Many Sailors..." so I'm including it for completion's sake. Suffice to say that I was extremely pleased to see Stormy Sea included in this year's Don't Miss the Boat sale, because it was the pen that broke me down and made me buy my very first Sailor. At the time, the one I bought was the only 1911L left, but we were able to order a few more for the sale, so now other people can share my love of this gorgeous pen.
I first wrote about admiring Stormy Sea in my article about my favorite pens of 2022, then described how I ended up penabling myself when I brought it home to write about Sailor nibs nine months later. This color is hard to describe. It's not flamboyant, but it held my attention every time it caught my eye in our display case at the store. As I wrote in my earlier article,
Why is it special? Well, it's the color. I'm not even a blue person, but Stormy Sea's blue sucks me in and drowns me. It's a rich, complex opalescent topaz blue with very slight hints of green. This isn't one of Sailor's sparkly pens, but it's not a solid color, either. The resin has a special luminosity, a subtle translucence and depth. If you look at it in good light, you can see sweeping swirls that glisten like ocean currents.
The complexity of this color is not noticeable at first glance, but I love its subtlety. It's a very, very sophisticated and elusive effect.
I don't use a blue ink in my Stormy Sea 1911L. I've actually been using Sailor Ink Studio 735 in mine, because I tried the color to test the nib, loved it, and didn't want to switch. However, if I were to pair it with a blue, I think Sailor Ink Studio 540 is a pretty good match.
(These last two photos feature my own pen!)
Metallic Purple
The Metallic Purple Professional Gear Slim isn't one of Sailor's prominent releases with a special name and a story, but as soon as I saw it, I got excited. Purple and orange are my two favorite colors, and I especially love purples like this one. This pen shares Stormy Sea's metallic sheen, but in the form of a slim Professional Gear, so it has a very different feel. I love this color, and am very tempted to buy this pen. It's the kind of shade I get obsessed with and can't stop thinking about. It just looks decadent and elegant to me.
I paired Metallic Purple with Sailor Ink Studio 450. It's not a perfect match, but it's the closest I could come. This color is very special and intriguing, and I love how it gets more mauve-y in certain light. It looks so different in the bright sunlight in the photo I used at the top of this article... like a completely different pen! The color's mercurial nature intrigues me still further.
The smaller Professional Gear Slim size feels nice to me... similar to my Pelikan M400 and M205, my vintage pens, and a number of my many Pilots. Will I be able to resist this pen? Not sure yet... it's definitely luring me.
Mexican Screwdriver and Goodnight
Well, speaking of my love of orange, I couldn't resist ending this article with another cocktail pen, like I did in my previous episode. I've never had a Mexican Screwdriver, but I do love tequila, so it sounds like a cocktail I'd enjoy as long as the orange juice was freshly squeezed and it wasn't made too sweet. As for the Mexican Screwdriver pen, I love this beautiful combination of warm, soft, succulent tones. It looks delicious, like a tropical fruit or irresistible drink. This pen was part of Sailor's recent Cocktail Cantina set, and I have no idea why it's one of the only pens from this set that we have left. I think it's the most beautiful one in the collection!
Mexican Screwdriver is gorgeous in any light, but it positively glows in the sunlight, with an unreal luminosity and warmth. I love that its end finials are a slightly different color than its barrel, an extremely subtle detail that really adds to the organic look of the pen. I'm not sure if it's just that they are less translucent because the segments are smaller, but the finials look lighter, cooler toned, and more opaque than the body of the pen... more of an apricot color. All the colors remind me of fruit... mangoes, apricots, tangerines, papayas, peaches. It's a nice pen. It paired pretty well with a cranberry-orange scone with melting dark chocolate on top during my coffee break today, too!
I teamed up the Mexican Screwdriver with Sailor USA State Iowa ink and enjoyed the soft early evening temperatures outside for a few minutes before getting back to work.
I hope one of the beautiful pens in this year's Don't Miss the Boat Sale speaks to you like they did to me! I ended up buying the Royal Tangerine 1911S earlier in the sale, and I am definitely on board now as a true Sailor pen lover. The sales event is almost over, but we may still have remaining pens left in some of these colors, in case you missed the boat.
-Laura P.
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