Wednesday, August 05, 2015

Pens From Mumbai Shops - Inspired By Aurora 88

An old post from Fountain Pen Network.

I was going through the pen box and saw a few pens that I had picked up from many Mumbai stationery shops. These were from the mid-1990s to early 2000s when I had a field job and had to traverse through all parts of Mumbai. I popped into every pen shop as a habit and picked up whatever I liked.

While there are many pens, I want to start with these three which were clearly inspired by the Aurora 88 contemporary pen. I have a couple of Senator pens and another Flair pen that were inspired by the Pelikan M200 and M400. I will post those pictures too.

I got these in local stationary shops in Mumbai for prices in the $8 to $12 range in local currency. I have tried very hard, but have not been able to get any more of these - even at the same shops. Most shops these days carry chinese pens like Baoer and Jinhao.

All of these are piston-fillers with nib & feed units that screw out. All of these have steel nibs that are uncalibrated, but write a Fine to Medium-Fine line. The age clearly shows on these pens as for a long time, these pens were ignored and kept in "less than perfect" conditions.

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From Left to Right: Orchid Black with Gold accents, Orchid Blue with Steel Cap and Gold accents, Flair President Black with Gold Accents.

I have another Flair President, but the nib-feed section is broken as is the piston.

The Orchid pens came as sets of Fountain pens and ballpoint pens.

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The Flair President

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Orchid with Blue Body

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The Black Orchid

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Hope you liked this. 

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