LAMY safari

If it’s good enough for Tony Stark, it’s good enough for all of us

Before we begin, I am not a pen enthusiast, not by any stretch of the imagination. However, I’ve grown tired of buying stuff; the number of cheap throwaway pens and other office supplies I’ve gotten through in my lifetime would be enough to fill a small ocean. So, this year, I decided to stop. I spent too much time looking at reviews, different pen types, and manufacturers; the last thing I expected to buy was a fountain pen. I’m a lefty, and I had nothing but bad memories of fountain pens, ink-covered hands, and artistic smudges where my writing should have been.

I decided to take the plunge!

Not because I suddenly became right-handed or because I found some revolutionary product that promised to solve my sinister issues. No, I was convinced by the Algorithm, YouTube’s algorithm, to be precise.

The algorithmic gods suggested the LAMY safari. The safari, first released in 1980, is cheap, made of plastic, and is the favored pen of one Tony Stark (or at least it appeared on his desk in one movie).

Product details

  • The LAMY safari is billed as a timelessly modern pen for the young - and the young at heart, and that makes sense; it’s often recommended as a ‘my first fountain pen.’
  • The pen has a sturdy, stainless steel nib, which comes in various widths and a left-handed variant.
  • The safari’s grip is not your typical pen shape, but an unusual design crafted for comfortable writing over long periods.
  • The safari also sports a small window to see how much ink is left.
  • The body is a comfortable 14cm of ABS plastic.
  • Oh, and it comes in a vast array of colors.

The good

I personally love the left-handed nib. While researching, I stumbled on some pen-fanatic subreddits, and the LAMY nibs were a divisive topic. For me, it just works; the ink flows well, the nib feels sturdy and allows me to write. Maybe I’m missing something that only real pen users understand, but if you don’t know, you don’t know.

The unusually shaped grip really does what it’s designed to do. Holding a regular cylindrical pen causes me pain; maybe I grip too hard, and my hand would ache after half an hour (school was hell). I was certainly not holding a regular pen correctly, and this is where the shape really helps: you can’t hold the safari wrong, the grip forces good finger placement, and I massively improved my control of the pen vs. the more traditional shape.

The safari comes in three flavors, the fountain pen, a ballpoint, and a rollerball. Even if I eventually move away from the fountain pen, I won’t return to a regular-shaped pen; I’m LAMY for life!

The bad

The ink! Oh, how I disliked the ink. The safari comes with a little ink cartridge, which is nice; it means I got to try the pen as soon as it arrived, but, actually, there are two buts.

The first ink-related issue was that the ink was kind of watery. Although it flowed well, the color changed; sometimes, it was dark blue, and sometimes, it was so pale I could have used it to create an ancient, faded tome for a D&D campaign.

The second issue is more of a continuation of the first, but the ink dries slowly. Maybe not a problem for a righty, but for me, I smudged it.

After that first sentence, I thought I’d made a mistake, but I already had a plan. The idea was to reduce waste; little plastic tubes had no place in those plans. I already had an adapter and some ink ordered and was waiting for it to arrive.

FYI, you can get little adapters that allow you to use an ink well instead of cartridges. Who knew?

Anyway, once the ink arrived, I switched the cartridge immediately. Yes, it was a little wasteful, but not as wasteful as chucking the whole pen. For the ink, I settled on iroshizuku ink by PILOT in take-sumi (Bamboo Charcoal), an excellent shade of black. This ink dries incredibly fast, and once dry, the color has a warmth that I can’t quite explain. Once I figured out how to use the converter, which took a few goes to get right, and cleaned the ink from my fingers, I was off, I was writing, and I was happy.

My other safari issue is nib-related. The right-handed nibs come in extra-fine, fine, medium, and bold. The left-handed nib comes in medium only. I want a bold nib, I tried the right-handed nibs, and they’re not as free-flowing as the left-handed nib; it’s like they grab the paper.

The lack of sinister choices is unfortunate.

And how it’s going

It’s going great! I have a solid pen, like I don’t think I could break it. Writing with the LAMY safari is an experience. It writes perfectly, and having a little ink well on my desk makes me feel all fancy-like.

The grip has improved my handwriting, it’s now legible, I write more, I read more of what I write. I’ve even started to journal!

It’s a great first fountain pen. No, it’s a great pen, and I can’t recommend it enough. Go buy one, your hand, and the environment will thank you.