New Moleskine Kindle Cover

Moleskine fans, I've discovered, are generally 'booky' people. I've found most people who always have a book on hand, while waiting for a train or just because the TV is a bit inane, also have a notebook at equally easy disposal. The two go hand in hand.


Or is that hand in glove? Moleskine have released a new Kindle cover. For those not aware, the Kindle is Amazon's E-book reader. Rather than describe it myself, I'm going to (gulp) defer to the official Amazon summary, which is surprisingly good.


From Moleskine, the legendary manufacturer of books-yet-to-be written, comes the newest analog-digital hybrid tool: the Moleskine Kindle cover. The features and style of this cover are classic Moleskine: sleek rounded corners, strong elastic band, and the iconic smooth black cover. The cover protects and cushions the Kindle device, in a silhouette that's instantly classic and contemporary. It's a simple design beloved by writers, artists, and readers for over a century.


It looks great, is surely high quality but most importantly, it has great applications beyond the Kindle. The way i see it is as a great study (whether professional or dilettante) tool and allows for easy use of two notebooks without needing a desk. Love it.


As far as i can tell it's only available on Amazon at the moment, but fingers crossed your local Moleskine stockist will soon also be thus privileged!

Moleskine Hand of the Designer

The Hand of the Designer, Moleskine's latest special project.

We recently learned of the Moleskine Hand of the Architect, an impressive Special Project by Moleskine to compile hundreds of original sketches by renowned architects into a 228 page Hardcover A4 book. It's a beautiful item and a really great idea, proving that paper and pencil still rule well into the CAD era.

A Sketch from the Hand of the Architect

And now, a new project has been undertaken by Moleskine, being the Hand of the Designer. It is a new book similar to the Hand of the Architect and also an exhibition of over 450 sketches from noteworthy designers.

The Hand of the Designer has some cool sketches.

You can check out all of Moleskine Special Projects and buy their stuff from NoteMaker. And a nice little novelty piece is the DoDo Case, a new iPad case fashioned in the image of everybody's favourite style of notebook.

MSK Celebrates 1000

More new stuff from Moleskine as the world's most famous notebook continues to drive user generated content as a cornerstone of what it is to use a Moleskine.


It's about your notebook being yours - like a sophisticated version of scribbling on your desk in high school - and so Moleskine, through events like DeTour and online applications like their template downloads, makes sure there's a wealth of user generated content available to break the homogeneity of just another notebook. To help each Moleskiner make theirs their own.


So there's a quick celebration of the 1000th upload available online. A cool gallery of some of the better templates. Download, print and pop it on your Moleskine notebook or diary. A new notebook sleeve or just extra pages.


Love it.

Trends in the Field: Upsetting the status quo...

Embossed logo on a Rhodia Webnotebook

Regular readers of Field Notes will know that we've been keeping a close eye on the progression of Rhodia. It's incipient rise to the top of the Australian market is interesting to watch, as one after another gets converted to the Orange & Black.

Image courtesy of An Inkophile's Blog - great reading for fountain pen fans!

The hardest heathens to convert? Moleskine fans. That's why we love anything which compares the two legendary Europeans (such as our 2010 Diary review), a little competitive rivalry can only be good!

Ink on Moleskine paper thanks to An Inkophile's Blog

So I was pleased to come across a great review at An Inkophile's Blog comparing the Moleskine Classic Notebook with the Rhodia Webnotebook. To sum it up - if you use a fountain pen, it's Rhodia hands down. If you like impeccable form, Moleskine takes the cake.

Ink on Rhodia paper thanks to An Inkophile's Blog

Have a read, grab your favourite pen and let us know - which do you choose?

For the record, i have to go with Rhodia on this one...and a Lamy Scribble Ballpoint...

Trends in the Field: Bloc Art

Gentian's Rhodia pad.

Following on from yesterday's post about Moleskine's myDetour exhibition, all about your Moleskine, your notebook and personalising an icon, Field Notes received a couple of emails just reminding us that there are plenty of other legends one can make their own.

BiffyBeans Rhodia Pad 8 Cover

Specifically, the Rhodia pad. The top stapled format is great for animated flicker art, especially the smaller pad 11 and 12. But even better is the cover itself!

eeShaun's personalised Rhodia cover.

The Moleskine's cover is great - durable, classy, quality. But there's not a whole heap to work with unless you go so your local embosser. The Rhodia Bloc pads, on the other hand, are perfect for making them your own.

Mitch from Flickr's Pad cover.

If you need some inspiration, see below or any of the following great blogs and pages. There's Rhodia Drive, eeShaun's cool design, heaps on Flickr, like Gentian's cover, Granny Kaas, Mitch, and of course there's Biffy Beans too.

Paul Smith's Rhodia pad designs. via OhJoy

In fact, it's so easy, so perfect, Rhodia sanctions the act. As we know, they're letting designer Paul Smith have free reign (I love the photographer above) over their pads and we can't wait for the results! We'd love to see any personlised Rhodia pads out there from the Field so get sharing Rhodia fans!

News from the Field: Moleskine MyDetour Update

Moleskine's wildly successful and innovative creative relay is about to hit what we at Field Notes consider to be the current global trend setter in stationery - Tokyo - as the MyDetour exhibition makes a stop in Japan's capital from October 16-November 4.

MyDetour entries from the San Fransisco leg of the creative relay.

Via Moleskinerie and moleskine.com, 5 of Tokyo's hottest designer book and stationery stores will host drop boxes where creative notebook lovers will deposit their decorated Moleskines.

Moleskine notebooks personalised.

To reward their disciples, Moleskine will invite the winner (ie: the most amazing notebook) to myDetour in 2010 and the 10 best books will be in an online gallery.

Geografia Globe - Japanese stationery is in bloom!

So keep myDetour on your radar as the Tokyo entries are sure to amaze.

Rhodia Metallic on display in Tokyo's Orange & Black Boutique.

Tokyo's stationery scene is huge - Rhodia in every high end fashion shop, Moleskine on every corner and niche producers like Geografia producing some ground breaking stuff.

News from the Field: Limited Edition Artist's Moleskine

More Moleskine news from the field this week as the iconic notebook continues to evolve and change and push new aesthetics, which we are all for. The stationery world is getting bigger and bigger, and Moleskine - one of the biggest players - is doing all it can to keep up with the younger up and comers!


Moleskine has had success with Patent Leather Diaries released as a limited edition series, and continues the limited edition vibe with a new collection in collaboration with artists and designers.


Each year, an artist/designer will be asked to design the cover of a limited edition leather planner and the 2010 edition is designed by Martí Guixé.


Born in Barcelona in 1964, Martí Guixé studied industrial design at Milan Polytechnic. His most well known work is for Spanish shoe retailer Camper.


The cool part about this diary (besides the leather) is the 81 labels designed by Guixe which are inside the inner pocket. The not so cool part (for us Aussies) is that it's not yet available down under.

We'd love to hear your thoughts on Guixe's work and Moleskine design, so drop a comment if this is your kind of diary!

News from the Field: Special Edition Moleskine at Woodstock!

Image courtesy of Moleskine.com

Exciting news for all international fans of the legendary Moleskine notebooks from Moleskine.com - a new special edition Moleskine notebook has just been released to commemorate the 40 year anniversary of Woodstock!

Image courtesy of Wikipedia

The summer of love may not seem totally in sync with the organisation and slightly high brow design of the classic Moleskine notebooks, but don't forget that Moleskine is also all about Peace, Love and Music.

Image courtesy of Moleskine.com

After all, Moleskine started out as a notebook for artists, writers, musicians and thinkers - the aristocracy of the art scene!

Whilst this limited edition Moleskine will not be available in Australia, we noticed our friends at NoteMaker are really letting their hair down with the Moleskine range to celebrate all the same.

Well, letting their prices down at least! The Moleskine Classic Notebook range is heavily discounted at the moment, so get in quick! Their range is practically at 1960's prices!

And while you're there, why not get a 2010 diary? (we all want the new Desk Calendar) Now we know why it's called the summer of love...

News from the Field: All New Moleskine Diaries!!

All Images thanks to NoteMaker.

I looked into my overworked 2009 Moleskine Notebook diary today as I do most mornings and realised that it's already July! July...why is that meaningful again? New financial year? Check. State of design festival? Check. Independence day? No, that's not it...

All Images thanks to NoteMaker.

And then i realised: It's time for a new Moleskine diary! The 18 Month Diary is underway. We had the Limited Edition one from NoteMaker which we loved but they're all sold out so i was happy to settle for the ever trusty Weekly Notebook diary for the next 18 months.

All Images thanks to NoteMaker.

But then when i got to NoteMaker to pick one up, i saw these: all new diary formats for 2010.

All Images thanks to NoteMaker.

There's the 2010 Desk Calendar Diary, perfect for making sure important dates don't get lost in amongst all my diary notes. And then there's a cool little project diary (not for me though) and a panoramic view diary as well. But the gem is this cool 12 Colours diary.

All Images thanks to NoteMaker.

A separate, new colour journal for every month, the daily format (with space to write down everything) and a gorgeous gift box in the Moleskine style.

All Images thanks to NoteMaker.

The only downside is that i can't use it until January! Oh well, i still love my Weekly Notebook diary.

News from the Field:Design Competition Update

It was bitter sweet news when we heard that the limited edition 2009 2010 Moleskine 18 Month Diary from NoteMaker's Annual Design Competition had sold out.


Bitter, of course, because it meant there were no more but sweet to see such support for a unique design and a cool competition.



So, we were super happy this week to find out that a second pressing has been released! It's not the 18 Month diary, but the Moleskine 2010 Weekly Diary and it has the funky "To Do List" design embossed too.

The guys at NoteMaker have told us that numbers are limited for this edition too and since the first version sold out so quickly, we're gonna get in fast.

News from the Field: NoteMaker 2009 Design Competition Winner!

Winning Design by Grace Lee

Our friends at NoteMaker have finally announced the winner of their 2009 Annual Design Competition (above) featuring the Moleskine 2009 2010 18 Month Diary! The limited edition of the winning design is now available to purchase, we're told, from NoteMaker and will ship from early next week onwards. So go and celebrate local design!

Shortlisted Design by Elyse King

This is definitely a great chance for Moleskiners (SkineArt, anyone?) and fans of grass roots Aussie design (like the guys at Grafik Museum) to get a really unique version of a stationery icon.

Shortlisted Design by Brentt Grigson

We really love the winning design ourselves: the real sketchy feel of it, like a page straight out of anyone's diary who's relying on their diary to juggle their life!

Shortlisted Design by Kristal Yeung

So well done to the winner - Grace Lee - and everyone who entered. The guys at NoteMaker have sent over a few of their favourite entries and there's a FlickR gallery as well of some of the shortlisted entries, so check it out!

Shortlisted Design by Cathryn Ruhle

News from the Field: NoteMaker 2009 Design Competition Winner Announced...

Gaping Void's Advertising Moleskine

...next Tuesday!

Following on from our blog about our Moleskine Top 5, we can't wait to hear who wins the NoteMaker 2009 Annual Design Competition, featuring the Moleskine 2009 2010 18 Month Diary.

Flying animal skineart via Frankie via Skineart

Better still, the winning design will be available to purchase soon, so we can all enjoy the grass-roots talent in Australian design amongst the stationery loving community.