Dear Scribblers
After yesterday's review of the Lulu Guinness Custom A5 notebook and the Lulu Icons Set of 3 A6 notebooks, the review continues...
50:50 Lip Diary for 2017 💋
Here's the review that most planner addicts have been waiting for, which you'll find is my most disappointing of all 3 items, but it's not all bad!
I love the design and A5 size. The cover is made of a study hard card with gold foil lettering and recessed black cloth blinding - allowing it to lay fairly flat. The pages are stitched in sections and glued. Here's the review that most planner addicts have been waiting for, which you'll find is my most disappointing of all 3 items, but it's not all bad!
There's a stripy silky ribbon bookmark, triangle card inside slip-pocket in the back cover, and 6 top-loading card pockets which are all useful. Although, I wish the top-loading files were spread out a bit more evenly throughout the book than they are. They appear at 3 weeks into the year, then one at a further 8 weeks, then we wait for another 16 weeks! Followed by 8 weeks, 16 weeks then the last one appears in the address book section 8 pages later. Obviously, there's a pattern here to the layout, which must be to do with how they are glued in, but it doesn't make a lot of practical sense. 2 have the multiple red lip design on one side and plain black on the other, and 4 are black and white stripes with plain red on the other side.
The main bulk of the diary is taken up with the layout of a week a page with notes opposite. This has always been one of my favourite styles to work with.
The diary begins with the usual personal information page, followed by a spread of blank red pages declaring the following page is 2017 Year at a Glance, and low and behold, it is! Next, there's the multi red lip design over two pages, stating that the next set of pages are a Month at a Glance... and you guessed it, they were right! I think you may be getting the idea that I think there's a lot of wasted space. I'm sure I can think of ways of using all this superfluous real estate. I must say, I do really enjoy how they have drawn the monthly layouts. Each month is on a single page, but you turn the book to landscape to use it, and you don't lose out on writing space, so much easier to use than the month across 2 pages.
This is followed by stripy pages separating the month from the main Week at a Glance. I love that all the days have the same amount of space, unlike some diaries that squash poor old Saturday and Sunday. All the main UK holidays are listed, along with the dates of the main international fashion weeks. A chic touch! As is the little red lips at the bottom of each notes page.
An address section (12 pages - a few too many for my liking) is next. Followed by notes and doodles - which has plain lightly patterned pages, sections entitled "museums, galleries & exhibitions", "films & books", 4 sides of numbered to-lists, 2 for shopping lists and 27 sides of lined note pages. Both of these have the ubiquitous patterned double page separator. It ends with a page of international dialling codes, and page listing international holidays for 13 'major' countries.
Unfortunately, it loses points for a couple of reasons - the last two pages, on my copy, were stuck together and ripped. A little disappointing, but I can overlook it.
The main reason I feel disheartened is due to the poor quality of the paper. It feels rough, yet thin, which lets the 'designer' style down.
It's so different from the notebooks reviewed yesterday. This paper is a world away in look, touch and how the pen feels when writing.
I also wanted show you a pen test, and you can see what it's like for yourself.
I'm not going to be able to use my fountain pens in it at all, and even though the other pens do not necessarily seep through, the depth of indentation of my writing is quite astounding! I know I'm not the lightest writer, but my hand isn't that heavy. I also gave it a quick wash of watercolour, the paper pilled immediately, but I knew that was a tough task. I think I'd only trust ball point pens, and pencils on this paper.
I know now that I couldn't use this as my main diary, as the limitations of pens would drive me insane. I love writing with my fountain pen, so I know I couldn't put up with that. However, it won't go to waste, as I'll be using it as my social media planner for the new year, along with my multi-coloured ball point pen!
If you love the Lulu Guinness aesthetic and her colours, this is a must... as long as you can look past the paper quality. There's much more going for it than not.
Happy Scribing!
Price & Codes
50:50 Lip Diary 2017
Style: 50125135
ISBN 978-1-84949-861-6
Lulu Guinness website - £18:00
Amazon UK - £13:06
50:50 Lip Diary 2017
Style: 50125135
ISBN 978-1-84949-861-6
Lulu Guinness website - £18:00
Amazon UK - £13:06
Made by Quadrille (Hardie Grant) for Lulu Guinness - www.quadrille.co.uk - www.quadrille.com
Prices shown as listed on www.luluguinness.com and Amazon Prime UK - 19 October 2016. For all these items, a quick search on the net brings up alternative stockists, too
Also in the range - A5 luxury notebook, and notecard set.
1. Please note that I am not connected to any companies mentioned in this post. I do not receive any products, funding or gifting from these businesses. All products shown have been bought by me, or gifts from family or friends. I mention the items because I like them or have my own private opinion about them. It's just little old me talking about ma stuff! ;-)
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