I have a penchant for classic stationery design. On the notebook front, any sort of leather or hard-bound notebook with gilded pages immediately gets my attention, and if the notebook is fountain pen friendly it’s a no-brainer. Letts of London - a UK stationery brand that is now under the same ownership as Filofax - has always appealed to me from a design standpoint but the lack of US availability and a reputation for simply being “ok” for fountain pens kept them off my radar.

Recently, that has changed. Letts was kind enough to reach out and send me two of their larger A5 notebooks featuring excellent 90gsm paper. This upgraded paper, available in Letts’ “Legacy” and “Icon” notebook lines, performed flawlessly, with zero bleedthrough or feathering (even with a stub nib) and good dry time. The only drawback, for some, will be that the notebooks are lined, though the ruling is narrow enough for my tendency to write small.

Letts also sent me a handful of other notebooks: a travel journal that uses the same 90gsm paper as the Legacy, and two pocket notebooks (standard and travel) which use a 3x6-ish “long and slim” format similar to the Kunisawa Find notebook that I’ve been using as my preferred pocket notebooks for the past year or so. The Letts pocket notebooks (both Legacy and Travel) only use 45gsm and 70gsm paper, respectively, so I have no expectations that fountain pens will perform perfectly, but that’s not something I necessarily look for in a pocket notebook, and in any event each comes with a slim ballpoint pen concealed in the spine of the notebook. Not only is this a clever touch from a design standpoint, but the ballpoint refill writes extremely well, and you can purchase refills directly from Letts.

I love the cream-colored paper in the Letts Legacy notebooks. You get 230+ pages, even in the pocket notebooks.

Takeaways and Where to Buy

I’ve always admired the classic (and classy!) design of Letts notebooks, though I’d previously heard that their paper didn’t always play well with fountain pens. Now that Letts has introduced versions of their larger notebooks containing the heavier 90gsm paper, that’s no longer the case. The good thing about Letts, and to a lesser extent their sibling brand Filofax, is their notebooks’ relatively widespread availability at brick-and-mortar retail. I hope to see that expand in the future, especially here in the U.S.

You can purchase all of the notebooks featured in this review directly from the Letts website. The pricing is reasonable given how much paper you get, with both the larger and pocket “Legacy” notebooks running $24.99. The travel journals are priced at $16.99 for the larger notebook and $22.99 for the pocket. The price on both pocket notebooks could be a bit lower, in my opinion, given the lesser paper weight, but I assume the price also accounts for the included pen. I will reiterate that currently only the “Legacy” and “Icon” A5 notebooks feature the 90gsm fountain-pen friendly paper, while the other products contain paper ranging from 45gsm to 80gsm. Be sure to check the specifications before submitting your order, if the heaviest-grade paper is important to you.

Disclaimer: Letts sent me the notebooks featured in this review free of charge, for review purposes. I was not otherwise compensated for this review.