My Favorite Stationery Items

These are my favorite and most commonly used stationery items. The ones I always reach for when I’m making spreads in my journal, filling in my reading journal, or planning for work!
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Journals & Notebooks

Ok, I’m quite picky about which journals and what kind of paper I use, so most of the time I custom-make them myself! If you want to go the custom route too, you can purchase one over in my Etsy Shop.

Pencil & Eraser

Sketching is really half the work of any journal spread or drawing I make. Really any pencil will do, as in any store-bought #2 or HB pencil, but I do have some recommendations:

If you have drawing pencils that are harder (ie. 2H), the lines will be lighter and easier to erase.
If you prefer a mechanical pencil, then this is the one I use and I don’t plan on ever straying from it. I also really like the eraser it comes with, and you can buy refills for the eraser end too!
Get a good eraser! There’s nothing worse than eraser that just smudges the pencil marks or damages the paper. I’m a fan of the Tombow Mono erasers. The other type of eraser I can recommend is the Tombow Sand eraser, which is a really rough eraser that WILL damage your paper if you over-use it, but is great for erasing mistakes in ink.

Pens, Pens, Pens

Writing pens

What I look for when I’m writing lots of text (ie. in my reading journal) is a pen that’s going to flow smoothly on the page, that won’t cramp up my hand, with ink that won’t smudge, and that will essentially make it look like I have pretty handwriting! My go-to for writing are fine-nib gel pens. Here are my favorites, from thinnest to thickest nib size. You’ll note that none of these are particularly fancy they are for everyday writing, so I use these pretty fast:

Pilot Juice Up 0.3 – If you like a pen with a really fine nib, this is the one you need! I’ve tested quite a few very fine pens and this is the thinnest I could find that isn’t also scratchy! It basically makes me feel like my handwriting is minimal and fancy even though it’s actually really not.
Uniball Signo DM 151 in 0.38 – This might seem like a basic black gel pen but this particular one writes really thin and smooooth, it’s my everyday go-to (I literally have these all over my house)!
Note: there is an even thinner (0.28mm) version of this one, but it’s not much thinner and scratchier when writing, so I don’t recommend it.
Zebra G402 in 0.5 – This gel pen writes just as well as the uniball pen above, but the pen itself looks a little more fancy because it’s made of stainless steel rather than plastic, and it has a super comfortable grip, so I like to use it for work!

If you’re looking for something a fancier to write with, I recommend fountain pens! I have a whole section on them below.

Fountain Pens & Inks

Nothing writes smoother than a fountain pen, and yet for years I was too intimidated to use them… now I wish everyone knew how ridiculously easy they are to use! Most people get intimidated by the refillable converter, so I made a little video to show you how simple it is here. Here’s another video explaining how simple it is to fill your pen.

Once you have that down, a whole world opens up to you – and it’s not just about the pens but the inks! My favorite place to get fountain pens and an incredible selection of inks is Atlas Stationers. I’ve even started using inks for painting – they are that beautiful!

One thing to watch out for if you start using fountain pens – the ink in fountain pens is water-soluble, so make sure you pair it with the right paper to avoid the bleeding!

Fineliners

Here’s why you would want (or not want) to use a fineliner:

PRO: Archival ink. This essentially means the ink is permanent & water-resistant… which makes them ideal for drawing and for combining with water-based mediums like watercolor!
PRO: Uniform line. You choose the nib size you want and, as you draw, the line won’t change width. This makes fineliners great for cross hatching or for monoline calligraphy.
CON: Fragile nib. If you also use these for writing, you’ll wear through the nib pretty fast (but check out my favorite writing pens instead).

I use these for drawing, or to combine with watercolor. I’ve tested quite a few fineliner brands, and there are two that I always go back to: Micron and Unipin. I like these equally, maybe micron is a bit more of a brown-black while Unipin is a bit more of a blue-black but really… they’re both black (though they also come in grays and sepia tones!)

Brush Pens

Brush pens have a long, flexible nib, which makes them perfect for modern calligraphy. You could also use these for drawing with looser lines with varying thickness (depending on how hard your push down). By now you’ve understood that I’m a little pen-crazy, so I have also tested A LOT of brush pens, but there are really only three I reach for. They are all small black brush pens, so they’re perfect for small calligraphy headers in your journal or writing envelopes. Here are my 3 favorites:

Tombow fudesnosuke, especially the hard-tip brush pen: I used this guy to learn calligraphy and definitely recommend it for beginners (and really any level)
Pentel fude touch sign pen: also a harder nib that’s great for learning, and probably my go-to nowadays. It also comes in tons of pretty colors.
Kuretake Zig Cocoiro brush pen: I like this one because it is the smallest brush pen I’ve found and you can get some really thin upstrokes that look as close to pointed pen calligraphy as you can get with a brush pen.

Highlighters & Markers

Tombow Dual Brush Pens

These are BIG brush pens, and I mostly use them to highlight things or for the marker tip because there is such a variety in the color choices! Here are some of my favorites:

Blue/Grey: N52
Holly Green: 312
Neutrals: 942 Tan / 992 Sand / 977 Saddle Brown / 947 Burnt Sienna / 969 Chocolate
If you’re a fan of neutrals, you could also get this set.

Zebra Mildliners

These are similar to the Tombow dual brush pens mentioned above, except they come with a highlighter tip (instead of a brush tip) and a marker tip, plus they’re a lot easier to carry around since they’re not as tall as the Tombow dual brush pens. Again, tons of colors, but my favorites come in this neutral color pack.

The affordable favorite: Crayola Markers

The title says it all, Crayola markers are the best option if you want to get tons of colors at a much more reasonable price. Of course, my favorite is the neutrals pack!

Decorative elements

Stickers & Washi

Stickers are a super easy & fun way to decorate your bullet journal. I like to buy stickers from small businesses & artists on Etsy and, of course, I also like to make my own that match my style and theme! You can find all my stickers in my Etsy shop.

Alphabet stamp set

I highly recommend using an alphabet stamp set if you want pretty header without too much effort. I love the old-school typewriter look of this set, but if you want a more classic font I also really like this one. Plus, they both include numbers, which is surprisingly important. You can use them with an ink pad, but I also like to use markers instead of ink (just “color” the letter then stamp), so the color options are endless!

Glue & Adhesives

I like to paste pictures & scrap paper or envelopes in my journal, so I always have some form of adhesive with me. Any glue stick will do really, but if you want to get obsessive about it like I do, this Tombow glue is my personal favorite. I also can’t live without my roll-on adhesive, which is this one from Tombow (this particular one sticks really well and won’t clump up like some of the other ones I’ve tried).

White Gel Pen

While I have used this to draw on colored paper before (like in this cover page, which remains one of my favorites to this day), I actually use my white gel pen most often to fix small mistakes. Specifically, I will always recommend the Uniball Signo White gel pen. And for larger mistakes, I usually cover it up with a sticker or, if all hope is truly gone, glue a blank page on top of it and start over! Or learn to live with the occasional mistake… (easier said than done)

And those are my favorites! I really tried to recommend items that I’ve known and loved for years, but I’ll be sure to update this list if I discover a new favorite. Did I miss anything you wanted recommendations for? Let us know your absolute, can’t-live-without-it favorite in the comments!