I’m just going to start right here, the Weskin is a little weird. There is a lot to like though so let’s start with that, then I’ll get to the weird.

This is a really well made journal or notebook. The stitching is top notch, tight where it should be and glued really well. I have zero glue creep in mine and we all know how much that irritates me. There are two ribbon place markers that are nice and long- 2 full inches extends past the bottom of the book. I love this. I can grab the ribbon, slid it to the right and open the book with it- the way place markers are meant to be used! Mine weren’t heat sealed but I sealed mine in about 2 seconds with my handy lighter. The cover is nicely textured fabric. I’m not sure what kind of fabric it is, but it has the look and feel of linen. It seems to attract less dirt than other fabric covered journals I own so perhaps this has a coating or some synthetic content. The Bookblock logo is simple and pressed into the lower back of the cover in gold foil. The edges are gilt and snap, crackle, and pop when the book is opened. Classy.

The journal opens flat and even folds over onto itself with ease. Doing this you can, as I have, write out of hand into the journal. The ruling is an interesting shade of blue grey that matches many of the pens I uses. The intensity at which is printed is a few shades too dark for my liking. The ruling doesn’t disappear into the background of my writing, rather it stays right there, front and center. It is less noticeable when I write in graphite or black ink, but my prefered blue grey tends to meld with it. The ruling doesn’t extend to the very edge of the page which is a tad old fashioned, and I know annoys some of you. Thus it bears mentioning. About 15 years ago having the ruling centered with a margin around your page was fashionable and expected, today, thanks to moleskine, the cheaper and easier alternative of extending the ruling to the very edges of the page is much more fashionable and prefered.* You will either like it or not.

The paper itself is ok. It reminds me of the Paper Oh! Ondulo I reviewed back here. It is a smooth to the touch coated paper that performs really quite well with graphite, ballpoint, rollerball, and gel ink. It is abysmal with any fountain pen. All of my pens regardless of nib size and ink combination feathered like crazy and bled through. Like the Ondulo, pencil is where it is at for this paper. Graphite feels awesome on it’s toothy coated surface. It’s not so toothy that you’ll wear your point down in a line or have severe smearing issues, rather, it’s just right for graphite. The weird. The cover is stiff flexible. Like the Firma-Flex you can roll this journal over onto itself and shove it into a back pocket. This is odd to me. Folded over onto itself you can write in hand. It’s not so flexible that the cover is limp, it’s still stiff. In a nicely fabric covered journal this just seems a tad… odd. That said, this is a perfect cover weight to shove into a bag with a lot of stuff inside. The bendability of the covers means that the journal conforms to the shape of the bag. I’ve been carting mine around for a month or so now, and I stick it in the compartment of my bag that holds my Lihit labs Bag-in-Bag. It conforms to the shape of the Bag-in-Bag and allows me to get more stuff in the bag. There is a note of genius in the oddity.

The bottom line when it comes to the Weskin is that I  like it, but I know to only use it with pencil and my favorite gel and ballpoint pens. It reminds me of picking out a nice journal back when I was a kid. At €15 this isn’t a cheap alternative to other brands out there. If you are a European stationery nerd, you’ll be happy to know these are made in Europe. Where exactly? I don’t know, but Bookblock is based in London.

If you are interested, head on over to the BookBlock site. Unfortunately BookBlock is still working on their shop and the Weskin is not yet available.

*As a bookbinder I can tell you it is MUCH harder to center lines in the middle of a page than printing the ruling to the edge and trimming. Getting the ruling centered is tough.

No affiliate links today, I was sent this journal for review by the folks at Bookblock. I think I gave a fair and unbiased review.