Multicolor Pencils

Multicolor pencils are not very popular today because they are very geeky, even more so than multicolor pens. The Norma and Fend pencils use 0.46 inch or 1.1 mm lead just like the old Scriptos and the still available Autopoint pencils. Compared to even 0.7 and 0.9 mm pencils these can take a lot of writing or drawing pressure without breaking.

All of the pictured pencils are at least 50 years old. The top two are Norma pencils, once available at any stationery store. The bottom three are Fend pencils acquired through eBay. The lead advance spurs on the Fends are easier on the hand when writing.

If you come across one of these or an old Scripto you can still get 1.1 mm lead for them from Autopointinc.com in black, blue, red and green for your drawing and doodling fun. Also, Roger Russell at Roger-Russell.com has a great web page about Norma pencils.

Writing Tools

I have been fascinated by writing tools and the surfaces on which to use them since fourth grade when I got a Norma multicolor pencil and started trying it on different types of paper. Since then I have collected a lot of pencils and pens, notebooks, pads and cards to try out and use. 

My current tools include Parker Jotters with Fisher Space Pen fine point blue and red cartridges, a lot of Uniball, Pilot and BIC ballpoint and rollerball and gel pens, Lamy and Waterman modern and Wearever old fountain pens, Uniball, Pentel, antique Norma/Fend, old Scripto and wood-cased pencils. I use them on ruled pads and Moleskine notebooks and loose paper and index cards in Circa and Rollabind bound notebooks and on large and small clipboards.


All of these tools and paper are fun to collect and use to communicate and to try to stay organized.