Aurora Optima 360 Monviso Stub

Sorry for the quality of the photos for this blog!!! It was taken with my iPhone because I sold this one faster than I could take my usual photos........... and still feeling a twinge of regret.

The Aurora Optima - one of my favourite pens. It has the length of a small pen (about a Pelikan 400) but the girth of a much larger pen, say the Pelikan m800... This particular limited edition is modelled after the snow caps of Monviso Italy. The material is stunning. It is celluloid acetate, so a stable friend of cellulose nitrate (flammable) of old. The material is translucent in the white parts and is alos iridescent at the same time.

Around the cap band - Aurora is tastefully done with the greek key. The motif of this band is different than the standard line of Aurora Optimas, and is reminiscent of the older cap band models, with what looks like three silver stripes broken up by two black ones. In reality, if you look closely, there are more silver bands than you can imagine. Plus, this kind of construction protects the cap lip from splitting, in case there is any tension on the threads when you put the cap on.

Apologies for the fingerprints!!! Again - photo quality sucks this time around and I am sorry, and not just Canadian sorry.  Here under the cap hides a beautiful and subtle ink window - where there is no visual distortion and a good look into how much ink you have remaining. Although with the Monviso, the slight translucence makes this an easy task also if you can look through it into the light.

What I appreciate also, is that the cap cannot really rub and scratch the pen surface AT ALL, because just above the threads is the ink window - which they are able to keep recessed such that this scratching doesn't happen. In fact, with a cap band that's solid, this is a worry.... I think of many a Pelikan and Montblanc that have this microscratching due to the rubbing of the cap band, and cap on the barrel.

The heart of the matter - the NIB! Aurora is known for its feedback, and certainly this one was different. The stub is very smooth, and has good flow. This is a limited edition pen and is therefore an 18k nib. The stub is approximately 1.3mm or so, but I don't have calipers to measure for sure. It is a pleasure to write with... and with the approximate 1mL of ink volume, you have quite a while before the pen runs out (approximately 5-6 A4 sheets, or 8 letter, in my general usage).

The iridescence can be seen in the above photo, with the subtle and vintage-y feel of the stamped brand and makers seal. Wonderful pen.

The clip is your general ball-clip, except even more tasteful. The gentle of the taper, as well as the smoothness of the "ball" which is more of a tear drop, has never failed to clip onto anything, even 5-6mm thick leather.

Here is a writing sample, and you can see - this pen lays down ink and is just gorgeous. It requires good use of writing-with-stubs technique to find its sweet spot, and rolling it off to the sides can cause significant issues if the tine opening doesn't touch the paper. However, once you learn the pen and the nib, you've learned it and its gorgeous especially on Tomoe river paper :)

SURPRISE FEED PHOTO!!!! One of the most stunning parts of the Monviso - is the red hard rubber and just amazing.

Final thoughts: I loved this pen, and it was my second Aurora Optima. It is a numbered limited edition that came out in 2015 and every year Aurora releases other limited edition pens. I really loved it, but eventually sold it to fund some other pens which I will be reviewing also. In my opinion, the only better stub than this one was a custom stub by Mike Masuyama. For a factory one - Aurora wins. Aurora is a great company with excellent materials and makes great pens. Can't wait to buy another one (probably an 88) in the future.

Leave me your thoughts!!!!