Bloomsbury Fountain Pen Shop, From £30: Present & Correct

Present & Correct is the stationery shop that graphic designers in London send their friends to, and its small fountain pen shelf is chosen with the same eye. Since 2023 it has traded from 12 Bury Place, London WC1A 2JL, a quiet Bloomsbury street that runs straight up to the side of the British Museum. Everything in the room looks as though it was picked for its shape as much as its function: ledgers, rubber stamps, archival folders and a tight edit of metal and plastic Kaweco pens that start at the price of a museum lunch.

Present & Correct opened its virtual doors in 2009 and opened its first physical shop in 2012, according to the shop's own history. Design magazine It's Nice That has credited the business to Neal Whittington and Mark Smith, and their graphic design background shows in the stock itself, where old office supplies are treated as small pieces of design history.

In 2023 the shop moved to its current Bloomsbury site, which it describes as an upgrade. The address has a stationery pedigree of its own, having previously been home to Blade Rubber Stamps, the much-loved stamp shop that has since closed its doors. Some online listings still show the old Clerkenwell shop, so make sure your map points to Bury Place rather than an EC1 address.

Fountain pens here are a focused selection rather than a wall of brands, and Kaweco, the German maker of compact pocket pens, makes up most of it. The Sage fountain pen, a Kaweco Sport in soft grey-green, costs £30. It is the classic octagonal pocket pen that is short when capped and full length once the cap is posted on the back, which is why so many people keep one in a coat pocket or bag.

Step up to metal and the Raw Aluminium fountain pen costs £65, light but solid, with a brushed finish that picks up scuffs gracefully. The Brass Kaweco fountain pen at £85 is the heaviest of the trio and develops a warm, darker patina as it is handled over the months. If you write for long stretches, hold the brass and the aluminium one after the other; the weight difference changes how the nib feels on the paper more than you might expect.

Pocket pens like these suit people who write in short bursts: a shopping list, a quick sketch of directions, notes on a train. The cap is the clever part, because it doubles the length of the pen once posted, so a pen that disappears into a jeans pocket still sits comfortably in an adult hand. If your writing tends to run to several pages at a sitting, try each pen with the cap posted and unposted before choosing.

Kaweco pocket pens take short international cartridges, and the shop sells boxes of six Kaweco ink cartridges for £3. That is the simplest way to keep a pocket pen going without carrying a bottle, and the cartridges are easy to swap on a bus or a park bench. Buy two boxes in different colours if you like to keep work notes and personal writing visually separate.

The rest of the shop is where most of the time goes. Notebooks with grid and dot paper, desk organisers, envelopes and vintage-style office supplies cover the walls, and the shop's eye for typography makes even a pack of index cards look considered. A pocket pen, a box of cartridges and a slim notebook from here make one of the most giftable stationery bundles in central London, all for well under £50 with the Sage pen.

The shop's contact page lists regular hours of Monday to Saturday from 11 am to 6 pm, a later start than most shops nearby, so do not plan a 9 am visit before the museum opens. The same page notes the shop will be closed on 24 October, which falls on a Saturday this year, so pick another day that week if you are travelling in specially.

Weekday afternoons are relaxed, while Saturdays bring a steady flow of museum visitors who wander in off Great Russell Street. The room is compact, so leave large shopping bags at your hotel if you can. Staff are happy to talk through the differences between the pens on the shelf, but the stock is small and several fountain pen colours sell out, so check the website for what is currently available before setting your heart on a finish.

Bury Place leads directly to the British Museum, so a visit naturally pairs with an hour in the galleries. The museum's Great Court, with its glass roof and round Reading Room at the centre, is a fitting stop for anyone carrying a new pen, since the Reading Room once hosted generations of writers and scholars. Entry to the permanent collection is free, which makes it easy to slot in before or after shopping.

From the museum gates on Great Russell Street, L. Cornelissen & Son, the artists' supplier founded in the nineteenth century, is a short walk along, with its green exterior and drawers of pigments and calligraphy nibs. Walk south for about ten minutes and you reach Seven Dials, where Choosing Keeping offers a much larger range of fountain pens and bottled inks for anyone who wants to keep going.

Address: Present & Correct, at 12 Bury Place, London WC1A 2JL. Regular opening hours from the shop's contact page are Monday to Saturday from 11 am to 6 pm, with a closure listed for 24 October. The nearest Underground stations are Tottenham Court Road on the Central, Northern and Elizabeth lines and Holborn on the Central and Piccadilly lines.

Prices from the shop's own listings: Sage Kaweco fountain pen £30, Raw Aluminium fountain pen £65, Brass Kaweco fountain pen £85, Kaweco ink cartridges in a box of six £3. There is no bottled ink on the shelf, so pair it with Choosing Keeping or Cornelissen if you need a bottle. Ask Karpo in the Karpo APP to string Bloomsbury's stationery shops into a single museum-day route.