The Art of Commonplacing : Curating a Life – Richard Barnard on Collage & Commonplace books
Hi everybody, and welcome to another episode of Stationery Freaks with myself, Rob Lambert, and of course.
Helen:And with me, Helen Lesowski.
Rob:And today, Helen, we're talking all things commonplace with our guest, Richard. Hi, Richard.
Richard:Hi there, Rob. Hi. Pleasure to be here. Thanks for inviting me.
Rob:No worries. Well, we were we were amusing, weren't we, Helen, about doing something about commonplace books. And I've got a commonplace book, but then when we sort of mentioned it on a show, Richard got in touch and seems like he's using a commonplace book in a way that is, I was amazed. So I think it's going to be a really insightful episode about what are commonplace books, how Richard uses them. I'll chip in with how I use them.
Rob:Helen, you're brand new to this whole idea, aren't you?
Helen:I know nothing about commonplace books. Mean, to me, it's like, in my head, it's just a notepad I have on the desk, surely. That's my scratch pad thing. But I'm betting that this is not that at all. I don't know.
Rob:We'll find out. So Richard, did you want to just introduce yourself to the Stationery Freaks audience and sort of like, how come you've ended up on the show? I mean, think it's kind of an interesting story. So over to you, Richard.
Richard:Cheers Rob, thanks. Yeah, I mean I'm delighted to discover the podcast I think more or less by accident I think on Spotify and I listened to a previous episode where you mentioned the possibility of a future episode dedicated to commonplacing and it was something that I have a passing interest in and something I've been doing for a few years or so now. So I dropped you a line and I think also mentioned that I do quite a lot of collage art in my spare time and got a bit of a passion for using stationery, vintage stationery for collage. So I popped a couple of those in the post to you because I thought they might be of interest and the invite to the show followed on from that. So thank you.
Rob:No worries. And, yeah, thank you for sending those through to me. I'll I'll obviously I'll include some photos in the newsletter that accompanies this. But, yeah, you should definitely check out Richard on Substack, I think, is where you're you seem to be quite active.
Richard:Yeah, I'm also on Instagram. I tend to post more of my collage art stuff on Instagram and that's been going a bit longer. I'm bit of a newcomer to Substack so still getting my head around that. So I tend to post more regularly on Instagram. I'll I'll send you the link again so you can post that again.
Rob:Yeah. Yeah. Definitely. We'll we'll include a link in the show notes and the newsletter. So, Richard, today's topic is commonplacing and commonplace books.
Rob:Now bear in mind that I think Helen obviously is is brand new to this. It's not just scraps on the table. There is a system usually, and it's a bit more involved than that. Did you wanna give us, Richard, a sort of, you know, an overview of what commonplacing is just so our listeners can sort of orientate themselves around that.
Richard:Yeah, sure. Mean, guess first of I'd like to mention, you know, I'm not an expert on this per se other than sharing experience of first hand use. There is an excellent book called The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper by Roland Allen that is a wonderfully kind of researched tome that goes into great detail about the history of common placing. And I suppose the simplest definition I came across was that it's the act of creating the best book you've ever owned. It's about collecting and collating those random snippets from newspapers, quotations, pieces of poetry, overheard conversations, recipes, lists, whatever you want, things that spark your interest collated into a kind of a single source.
Richard:And Ralph Waldo Emerson talks about it's really anything that to you is like the blast of a trumpet which is a description I really like. So whenever you hear a trumpet blast is, the idea is you kind of capture it and write it down in this notebook for later review. So it's really a collection of things that have interested you.
Helen:You're a fan Rob aren't you of that particular The Notebook?
Rob:It's wonderful book. Just I was rummaging around on the shelf for it today. It's one of those books that sort of almost I say this about a lot of books, but this one particularly, you almost want to dip the entire book in highlighter fluid. Every page is is is sort of turned over at the top because like you say, it's so well researched and
Richard:Yeah.
Rob:It just tells this wonderful story. I I couldn't put the book down. I read it cover to cover over, you know, basically a couple of nights. It's it's really good. So, you know, commonplace, I like that, you know, something like a trumpet, something that captures your attention, something that you wanna keep.
Rob:I really love that. But a commonplace book, you know, we're we're stationary freaks here, but I think this is where me and you may differ, Richard, because I use digital tools store some of that stuff. Yeah. I know that sounds sacrilege on a stationary freaks podcast, but we've always sort of tread that line between digital and analog. And you use a notebook for this, don't you?
Rob:Did you wanna sort of talk through what that notebook sort of looks like? Is it a big one, small one and and you know, how many of these do you get through a year?
Richard:Yeah. Have I have a bit of a system. I think it's interesting that actually the the the history of the common placings, they started off by what's called a waste book. The idea of something that's disposable. So it was really used by merchants apparently in the mid thirteen hundred's in Florence and it would essentially be a record of accounts and a record transactions that gradually evolved over time into something more personal, more kind of personalised that would include prayers, book episodes, songs, recipes, lists and such and certainly became more popular in that way, Victorian era.
Richard:So I have a kind of a daily waste book which is a small notebook, kind of got a little leather cover that I insert in that generally I carry around with me and just note down anything that I'm reading that's of interest, like I say, overheard kind of conversation, interesting facts, whatever sounds like to me the blast of a trumpet on that particular day. So I kind of keep those in my kind of daily waste book and then I have a daily journal. I have a nichey kind of cousin Helen you'll be familiar The The techo. I don't need a very exciting life. So often there's not a lot to record in that day by day so what I'll tend to do is then transfer those daily wasteful quotes into my daily kind of journal, Canna Planner so that's where they go for posterity as it were but they have to admit the thought of losing that is quite anxiety provoking so I get a bit obsessive after that because most of the quotes I also record electronically on a pages document as well which is now several 100 pages long that I hashtag because I don't
Helen:know whether you've ever been in
Richard:the position of I know a perfect quote for that situation but I just can't quite remember it and that fills me with horror! So I tend to hashtag them just to allay my own anxiety so that if I do have an inkling, I'm sure I know a good quote about that. At least then I can go to the electronic version and I can search the hashtag and then more often than not then I'm able to recall it. So it's actually quite a DM. It's more fun than it sounds.
Rob:So how many of these commonplace books have you got? I mean do you keep them when you've, I mean, you describe them as a waste book, but I'm assuming that you keep all of your historical commonplace books.
Richard:Yeah. Gosh, the idea of a waste book seems like a contradiction in terms of that. Could spare the idea of chucking them away. So my children are gonna be lucky enough to inherit a whole pile of kind of notebooks that I kind of like to kid myself will be a passing interest to them. So the daily waste books just tend to accrue.
Richard:I've only I switched to the Hibonetschy kind of journal just over a year or so ago so I'm on my second one of those so obviously those are for keeping and posterity and I suppose I have about another three kind of notebooks on the go that are more topic specific. I mean my other passion in life is backgammon. I play quite a lot of backgammon so I have a dedicated strategy notebook for kind of backgammon. I'm also very much into photography so I have a separate kind of notebook for that as well and then a separate one for more kind of, I suppose terminology is kind of, I'm retired now but I amassed quite a lot of information over my career, some of which I'm a bit reluctant to forget it. So I tend to jot down things in there that I'm kind of keen not to forget.
Richard:So generally I've got a few notebooks on the go at any one time but of course it's a wonderful excuse to buy more.
Helen:I was gonna say, I'm amongst friends here, Richard. I mean, I think we talk about having six or eight notebooks on the go at any one time, like you compartmentalizing, maybe not quite in that way. And I'm fascinated to know sort of the commonplace notebook seems to be a kind of and everything else. So it's the first place you go, but at the same time it's because it doesn't fit in any of the other sort of themed notebooks.
Richard:Yeah, it's more a generic collection. Here are things that have interested me this week if you like and I think a key part of that I think and of the whole idea of commonplacing is the process of review as well. There's a person called Ryan Holiday came across saying, you know, your commonplace book over a lifetime or even just several years can accumulate a massive true wisdom that you can turn to in times of crisis, opportunity and depression. So the idea is they're not just passively in there, it's something you can look back on. I think that's the fun bit for me as well is that often you know, there are things you've completely forgotten about and then some pleasure to be had in looking back over the journal.
Richard:In fact, I came across recently, there is a phrase, a techno kaiji or kaji, K A I G I, Japanese term for the formal kind of notebook meeting with yourself. Apparently you can schedule, you should schedule an annual general planner meeting with yourself where you reflect on what you've been using and whether you want to continue that into the next year and it's a kind of a process. Well it's reviewing the process really in terms of how you use the notebooks, how relevant they've been and what you need to do to change to improve things going forward. So it seemed very much a formal review process.
Helen:That's fascinating. I mean I actually probably do something very similar to that. At the end of the year is what's worked for me? What hasn't? Do I want to keep will it serve me next year?
Helen:Has my life changed and it worked at the beginning and it doesn't work so well? Now all of those kinds of things. Like that. Whether there's a real word, that's very reassuring.
Rob:You did this didn't you, Helen? So it wasn't the beginning of this year, was it? It was the beginning of last year. I think anyway, I'm losing track of all time. You switched over from the bullet journal to your new system.
Helen:So it was the end of the year before actually. So it would have been 2020, 2023. I then said, I'm gonna have a go with Hobonichi Teko, which I have loved, I have to say. It took some getting used to and I think my overriding feeling was that January was not the time to do this. Having it, I find myself in July quite excited about the fact that I can buy the new Hopinichi a few months.
Richard:Do you use the Cousin?
Helen:Yeah I do.
Richard:Yeah likewise. It's great isn't it because you can kind of customise it with a dedicated cover and what I'm really impressed with is I've forgotten the technical term but they use a special paper don't they that is ultra thin but miraculously doesn't bleed with a fountain pen either So it's a journal that's safe.
Helen:Yeah, Tomoe River I think it's called.
Richard:That's right, yeah. They've changed it recently but it's fantastic paper, super thin and safe to use with a fountain pen. Really enjoy using it.
Helen:Not felt tips though I'm afraid. You mentioned collages for the commonplace book and my heart soared at the thought that that might include stickers because you know. I
Richard:knew this would come up. I did some research and if you Google search commonplace and stickers, the results zero.
Rob:There you go Helen, a new niche for you.
Richard:I did try. I did try. Sorry, I couldn't work stickers into this.
Helen:No, no, no, it's absolutely fine. It's super useful because when you're talking about collages, that's really why I said it. Because what are you making your collages? What is the purpose of the collage? Is it like genuinely like scrapbooking and these kind of recording the history or is this an artistic, I haven't seen, I have to be honest Richard, I have not seen your collages.
Helen:So is this artistic representation or is this sort of memory placement?
Richard:It is primarily for the joy of the art of it, just for the process of it and I just enjoy it for the art. They've been kind of fairly big on photography over the years and more recently during lockdown. I used to do a lot of street photography and obviously during COVID, enjoying lockdown, I wasn't able to get out and about on the streets. Part of my photography involved a lot of photographing torn posters, it's abstract pictures and of course during lockdown, I wasn't getting out. So wonder if I could create my own torn posters.
Richard:So essentially that's how it started. I started to collage as a replacement for torn posters. That's evolved into something I suppose a bit more hopefully a bit more kind of artistic that I started to bring in other elements like acrylics and art making and more vintage items I suppose. There's something about using an old picture post from the 1930s, 1940s, whenever, the nostalgia feel. And stationery fitted in very well with that.
Richard:I managed to get my hands on a whole stash of 1930s, 1940s discarded office stationery. So lots of letters and robbed those were used as the source for the things that I sent to you. And I think the beauty of that for me was that it was a paper with a history, a story, a purpose that's now transformed into something new really you know and that real kind of nostalgia feel for it, that vintage correspondence became kind of an object in its own right and if you get a chance to look, you'll see that you know, I transform them quite significantly. Just trying to capture though the essence of the mark making and typography.
Helen:That sounds really lovely. I'm looking forward to going and having a look.
Rob:And I think Richard, we caught up on a call before we started recording this and I I bought some vintage stationery also, some ledgers. I'm a big fan of ledgers, which is actually almost a precursor to the to the commonplace book.
Richard:Yep.
Rob:And I can't bring myself to chop them up. Just I just can't do it. I keep looking at them going, they'd be awesome. You know, they make a really nice picture or I could doodle on them and stuff but I just, I can't, I don't know.
Richard:I know, I think I sympathize with you on that. I'd seen one at a market which was an old blacksmith's ledger that looked really interesting but I knew if I bought it, I couldn't possibly bring myself to destroy it, that it was a valuable kind of social record and I think, I mean that's the thing with the collages, I think you do have to steal yourself sometimes and ripping into a letter is yeah, it's bit like starting a new notebook in fear of making a mistake. It's the what if. So yeah, sometimes you just have to go for it. But I definitely sympathize about the ledger.
Rob:We've talked before, Helen, quite a number of times about ruining a perfectly good notebook with that first page. Just like, oh, I can't use this notebook now, I'm gonna have go and buy another one.
Helen:Actually, would be a really good question for me to ask Richard. So here I am brand new and I have a lovely, beautiful notebook that I bought from choosing keeping at vast expense. So if I was gonna turn that into a common place book, where do I start? What would you recommend would be step one for newbie Helen without stickers, obviously? I can live without stickers, it's fine.
Richard:Yeah, I think just get stuck in. There is a gentleman by the name of Roger Hudson who's actually published a gentleman's commonplace book and I was reading through the introduction for that and he talks about this. He was saying that commonplacing is perfect use for those expensive unused notebooks that you feel guilty about not using and become simply elegantly bound scrap paper. And there's some great advice in that book, know, he's saying newspapers, magazines are important resources. Then there are conversations, broadcasts, overheard remarks, variety, the unexpected.
Richard:So I think just get stuck in, it's that blast of the trumpet again, what's the kind of material that you'd like to read in yourself? And I think he also makes the important point that you don't go on a special search for these passages, for these snippets, that they are things that are found in the normal course of reading. So don't copy stuff from other people's commonplace books or anthologies. For example, I think the idea is the serendipity, the spontaneity. Know quite often if I'm reading Substack, there might be an interesting quote that I'll copy and paste and then later transfer into my kind of daily journal.
Richard:I think it's just the joy of finding things serendipitously as you go about your kind of day to day reading.
Helen:That's really interesting. I did build, we did a podcast ages and ages ago where I was saying I was putting together a list of sort of quotes and useful advice and all sorts of bits and pieces for my daughter And she was very interested in having this. And my problem is that I never finished it. Started, I did all this lots of lovely stuff, but how do you know when you're done? How do I know that I've written enough?
Helen:Have I run out of pages? Do you see what I mean?
Richard:Oh it's never done. There are always more notebooks to buy. Yeah it's a lifelong process because we hope, don't you, that you're going to carry on and continuing to discover things that kind of interest you and I think I like the idea of that kind of legacy kind of function. Again you know kind of a record of what made us feel alive. I suppose it's saying really isn't it, look this is what mattered to me.
Richard:I think I may be deluding myself, but that might be of interest to my kids at future point.
Helen:I think Rachman himself is exactly the same thing, aren't you?
Rob:Yeah, exactly. You know, I've got hundreds of notebooks that are full of, know, commonplace ideas, as well as digital stories, is absolutely jam packed. And
Richard:yeah,
Rob:yeah, I kind of persuade myself and convince myself that my kids are going to read through this one day. You know, with with soaring energy prices, they'll probably just burn them for heat. But, you know, maybe they'll read it, maybe there'll be something. But you're right. I like that point of view on it.
Rob:This is what's interesting to me. Now, is that going to be interesting to anyone else? Maybe, maybe not, but that's not the point, is it? These aren't for sharing necessarily. These are for collecting your own thoughts and your own observations and your own things that you've chosen to notice.
Richard:Yeah, I mean you think at the time, don't you, that you won't forget but the reality is of course you will and know personally I just find it so frustrating when you know you've got this perfect quote for something you just can't quite recall it or being able to. I mean I think I guess there's an obsessive quality to it as well, isn't there? There's a famous novelist, Joan, I think it's Didion or Didion, he says that keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether. Lonely and resistant rearranges of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some pre sentiment of loss. So it's like a motivation to preserve and not to lose things.
Richard:There's probably a pathological nature to all this.
Rob:I so. I mean I use a common place and the reason I do use paper and digital, but I use them to in a sense, build not necessarily content, but ideas so that I can mash these things that I've observed, these quotes. You know, maybe somebody said something particularly remarkable in the office, and I'll sort of capture the essence of that. And that searchability, and we've been back and forth, Helen, I mean, in various podcasts about how do you find things again when you want them? Yes, there's many different tools, Zellecasten, and all sorts of different ways to do this.
Rob:But for me, having those little quotes as individual notes within Apple Notes, for example, means I can search and I can find them. Do you tend to always capture them analog? Not necessarily in a book dedicated to commonplacing. It's probably got lists of food shopping in there and ideas for blogs and all sorts mixed in with that. But I do like that ability to just capture whatever interests me and then find it again and for me that's the blend of those two systems.
Richard:Yeah and I think there's an archival quality to it as well. One of my notebooks that's been going for my kids are in their 20s now but fortunately I have a notebook of all the embarrassing things they said when they were kids and boy is that fun to bring out at Christmas and read out aloud especially if they've got kind of boyfriends girlfriends with them as well.
Helen:100%
Richard:Guaranteed, I can heartily recommend that.
Helen:You know, what struck me just while you were talking there, Richard, is that's exactly what we used to do in the old days with photographs. And this commonplace book, now that photographs are digital, they're so easy to take, you can take thousands of them, they're less meaningful. Maybe this idea of capturing the essence of something important is like the photographs used to be sort of fifty years ago. What do you think about that as an idea?
Richard:Yeah, I think there is, isn't there, there's a bit of a reaction against digital now, isn't it? Know, I know film photography, analog photography took off massively, know, Polaroid came back and started producing kind of film again, know, the rise of stationary kind of notebooks are such big business as well. I think vinyl of course, know more I think vinyl albums are outselling their digital counterparts in some instances. So I think yes, there is something about the permanence of it and I know Rob, I think you'd mentioned in the previous podcast about the catastrophe of losing all your Apple Notes. Think being absolutely horrified when I kind of listened to that, it filled me with terror.
Richard:So I think there is something reassuring about having it written down in black and white as well. With the added cost, there's a risk of losing the notebook. So I think hopefully I'm kind of covering both bases really. Digital archive goes down although I do have copies back on the cloud and whatever. But also if I lose the notebook, well at least I've still got the source material that needs to be.
Rob:This is a really good book called The Revenge of Analogue, I think it's called. Can't remember the It's author's very good. One of the key reasons that he gets to, for the, you know, the revenge of books and final, like you talked about in analog photography is they're finishable. There's not this never ending stream of masses of space and never ending feeds and social. There's an end to it, there's sort of beginning and end and I like that idea of a notebook as well.
Richard:Yeah, the photographs sort of worry aren't they? Think people's whole family archives stored on a disk somewhere that's live at the crack and burn and I think you know, the joy of finding a box of photographs in the loft of you know, your parents for example that that's a joy that's gonna be lost. Think to future generations. So, I think I mean, I'd, you know, personally make the effort to print stuff out and stick them in a photo album because it worries me that so much is just digital and could easily be lost.
Rob:Yeah, I mean, I've gone through all my my dad used to be a keen photographer way back in the 60s 70s and all these little slides. So I bought a dedicated slide converter and turn them all digital to keep an extra backup of them as well. So my son's just been on holiday. He went with his mates and I said, go on and show us some photos of your trip. He took one photo and I think it was a kebab that he had on late night.
Rob:I was like, you've got no photos of your mates. You've got no record of where you went, nothing at all. He said, I'll remember it. I was like, well, you think that now it's sort of 18, but yeah, when you're my age, no, you'll taking photos.
Richard:Yeah, I mean how nice would it have been if we'd realized it? I mean I wish I'd realized this when I was a kid you know and started recording, commonplacing as a kid or keeping a diary. Think you know, I guess as we all did, you get a diary for Christmas when you're a kid, You probably do it for a few days and then stop but you know, I often wish now that to be able to look back on a year by year basis of all the things you did because clearly so much is forgotten and it would be nice to reminisce now.
Rob:Alright. Well, think about the time. We're about twenty six minutes into this and we've got Desert Island Stationery to go. Our I won't say world renowned, but it is a quite a popular part of our podcast when we do have guests on. And I think, Helen, we should probably record one, just me and you again, a reset where we use the inspiration from all of our guests
Helen:Yes.
Rob:About survival rather than just stationery that we like.
Helen:We might like to keep. Yes.
Rob:So Richard, five items you would take with you on a desert island. Should we go for your first one?
Richard:Tough choices, tough choices. So I think my first would have to be I was lucky enough to be bought from my son. I had a sixty first day recently. My son very kindly bought me the brass Queveco Sport Fountain Pen which is a wonderful bit of pen. It's the brass version of the Quebeco band.
Richard:Do a classic which is these mini fountain pens in plastic but was very kindly brought the brass version and it's a lovely weighty fountain pen and because it is made of brass, it's already developing a nice kind of patina on it as well so it kind of wears away slightly where you hold it. So that's something that I use on daily basis and as a brand, I find them really reliable as well. I've got two and they both I've never had any issues. They both start first time even if you don't lose them for a couple of days and I know my son has one as well and he does lots of sketching and illustrations with his and he finds the same as well. They're just a lovely fountain pen to use, reliable and fun to use.
Helen:Nice.
Rob:Nice. Good, good choice. I like how that hadn't, didn't have a sort of second use of, you know, being used as a weapon or anything like that.
Helen:It reminds me, Helen, of
Rob:the original one, which was quite entertaining. And that sounds awesome. You know, we've had a number of people on that that are big fans of ink pens and fountain pens and Yeah. I've I've just bought a couple of new ones as well. So, yeah, I think they're seeing a resurgence as well, I think.
Richard:Yeah, I think it's something about the haptic quality to that. It's the feedback that you get as you're using it and writing with it as well on the page.
Rob:Yeah, I mean, Helen, you've got what, 300 fountain pens?
Helen:I just turned my head actually a moment ago to look because I've got I have got a few. Not in the you know, it's not it's barely a collection, I think you'd say, Richard. To be fair, less than a dozen. Probably. It's close
Richard:to Oh, you're just starting.
Rob:Alright, Richard. Item number two then on your Desert Island stationery.
Richard:Yeah. This was another birthday gift. I had a great birthday. It's, I don't know, come across the brand Londo, L O N D O and this is there. It's called Leather Padfolio which is probably a six by six zipped leather case that has a little insert to keep a notebook in it, the field note size kind of notebook as well as several loops for inserting your pens as well.
Richard:In fact, I'm holding it as we speak. So yes, it has five pen loops in it and it's a joy. It has a great texture. It's got a beautiful exterior kind of leather case that you know is going to last years and again something that's probably going to develop a nice patina. A really nice secure metal zip and I just like the idea of my favorite pens and notebooks being in one single place and easily accessible so I would have to take that with me as well.
Helen:I would get joy out of just looking at it actually.
Richard:Well I do. I'm looking at it now and it's a pleasure to behold.
Rob:Yeah I was sat up in the house this morning while the kids were eating breakfast and I was just looking at the bag that I take down to the studio, I've got a studio in the bottom of the garden. I said to my wife I've really got to simplify things haven't I? I mean this bag is ing. I had to carry it separate handles. I couldn't hold it together.
Rob:I had to carry each handle in different hands. Yeah. The thought of having it all in one place still appeals. I mean, we've talked about this a lot, haven't we, Helen?
Helen:Yeah.
Rob:We've got too much stuff. I've got too many notebooks. Yeah. That sounds awesome. Alright, so we've got the breast fountain pen and we've got the leather sort of paper folio.
Rob:What's item number three?
Richard:Already mentioned it would have to be the Hobonichi Techo. I think one just to keep her a day by day record but if I could take previous volumes as well, of course I could sit there and look back over the previous quotes and snippets and items that have brought me pleasure in the past. I think it would be nice to sit there and reminisce as well as do a daily record on the island as well.
Rob:I mean, you know the rules are very flexible in this game. I I think as long as all the notebooks were bundled together, then absolutely, you can take all of them.
Helen:Yeah. Sounds good. Helen might have
Rob:a a different opinion on that one.
Helen:We don't. I know. Next time we do this, I'm taking your lead, Rob, and I'm taking all the things, all of them.
Rob:I think I might draw the line at sort of a big pallet full of notebooks. If
Helen:If it fits in one bag, I think it counts, Rob, as one. I think that's the rule I'm taking here.
Richard:I'd be happy just to take the Hobonichi because that's, like I say, that's that's got a thick volume in and of itself. So there'll be plenty of reading material there. So if you want to limit me to one, it would have to be that one.
Rob:Okay what about item number four then Richard?
Richard:Again another fairly recent discovery is my three tier expandable pencil case. Oh I know, who knew you could get three tier pencil cases that are expandable? It's great. It holds loads. This is just by a company called East Hill.
Richard:There's several available from your usual kind of supplies, but it holds so much stuff. It's got a lovely zip compartment in the lid where I keep all my ink cartridges and and rubbers and bits and pieces. Then there's a middle section that's pen lute so again, you can put your fountain pens and then this big space at the bottom with an expandable zip that takes everything else. I've got all sorts in there, sharpies, highlighters, rulers as well. So I think again it's just the idea of everything being nicely contained in one place.
Richard:So it would have to be a pencil case.
Rob:Three tier expandable pencil case.
Richard:Oh, what a time to be a lunnish. Imagine,
Rob:Helen, how many stickers you
Helen:could use with those tiers. Never mind that. How many pens you could get in there? I mean, I I you know, I collect pens and notepads. It's nice that, you know, there's ways of grouping these together now, you know, expand them
Richard:with pencils. There is a lot you could happily cram many a fountains in any of that.
Rob:Exactly. Well, remember Helen, we did that episode on, the traveling stationary freak and we were telling a story and I was in, Heathrow and I'd I'd been lucky enough to be an upgraded business. So I went in for the first time ever in my life into the lounge to have something to eat. Didn't even know this thing existed. And I was in there and there was somebody who was doing collage and scrapbooking and sticker stuff and she must have had like a 100 pieces of stationery.
Rob:She must have had some sort of expandable pencil case to carry that part
Richard:around. Oh, I'm sure.
Helen:It was a
Rob:full on setup for like an artist. It was incredible. Really good.
Richard:Yeah. Great. That's the beauty of collage, the portability of it, yeah.
Rob:Okay, number five then, Richard.
Richard:Well actually that perfectly segues into number five. Funny you should mention that. This might be a bit of a stretch but I was thinking I'd have to take a glue stick with me and if I'm taking a glue stick, I'd have to take some scissors and I have a little plastic box that I take on holiday with lots of collage scraps in it so I'm hoping that counts as stationary on the basis there's a goosebump I'd have to take my mini travel collage pack. I'm not sure of the chances of any paper washing up on this desert island so I'll probably have to take a little stash with me as well.
Rob:Oh, that's cool. I mean, if it's the same desert island, there'll be everyone else's stationery. Bits of paper stick to trees and also as well.
Richard:There's hundreds of notebooks lying around. I think
Helen:that's not much a desert island as so much as a stationary freaks retreat, isn't it, Rob?
Rob:It is. It is. It is. I was actually messing about with that episode the other day, and I don't normally use AI very often, but I did ask it to generate a picture of desert island stationary. And some of the stuff it came back with was bizarre to say the least.
Rob:But yeah, you can just imagine an island full of stationary freaks. That would be entertaining indeed. All right, just to recap then, so Richard, you're gonna take with you on a desert island the brass fountain pen. Yep. We got the leather folio holder for the paper.
Rob:Yep. And you've got a Hobonichi Teco. Then a three tier expandable pencil case. Mhmm. And then number five, breaking the rules, pushing them a little bit.
Rob:You're gonna go for a glue stick and scissors, which I think could be considered a combo that's necessary to to tick just one box there.
Helen:I think if they all fit into the box with the collage papers, that's a kit. Right? So I think that's
Rob:a problem.
Richard:Yeah. They do. They do. It's a small plastic box, all nicely contained.
Rob:Yeah. It's a collage kit. It's wonderful. That's it. That's awesome.
Rob:I like it. You've you've approached this from what you like and what you'd enjoy there rather than survival. So we're getting all
Richard:Oh, yeah. I'm not gonna live very long to enjoy these things.
Rob:Oh, well, I think me and Helen, we'd be lucky to get through a day. You're taking with us yellow legal pads and pens, think basically, wasn't it?
Helen:That's what you had a box of pencils you took or something.
Rob:Yeah, box of pencils. Two fifty. Yeah. That was awesome. Thank you so much for that, Richard.
Rob:So hopefully we've covered everything there about commonplace. Is there anything else, Richard, you wanted to bring to life about this subject that we might not have covered already?
Richard:No, hopefully that's covered the, you know, the the the key purpose and the key points and a bit about the motivation as well in terms of why do it. I guess, you know, give it a go. Nothing to lose.
Helen:I have one last question, if I may, for you Richard, if that's okay. Is there any parameters, any constraints or recommendations you'd say for which kind of notebook or or any restrictions that you would recommend putting on a a notebook that you were about to use as a brand new commonplace notebook?
Richard:Not at all. Whatever takes your fancy and I think that's the beauty of it in terms of you know, you can any size. I think I was saying that it's a good use for those notebooks we bought on impulse and are lying around and we're feeling very guilty for not using. So it is purely a place, a common place to record things that interest you. So go with what you like.
Helen:Thank you.
Rob:Yeah, and I'd encourage anyone that's interested in this to do a Google search, an image search for commonplace books because there's some wonderful history, historical examples. You go down a rabbit hole and spend seven hours looking at other people's notebooks.
Richard:Yeah, I mean they've got a rich history. I mean Marcus Aurelius, Thomas Jefferson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Locke, I mean they have, yes, many prominent figures in history of gaining notoriety for common placing. So yeah, worth a Google search and again, I'd highly recommend the book by Roland Allen. There's another book as well, How Romantics and Victorians Organized Information. That's published by the Open University Press by Gillian Hess, H E S S.
Richard:That's I've only looked at a sample of that. I've not got that but I suppose as you'd expect with it being an OUP publication, it's a much more dense kind of academic tone. It looks fascinating but doesn't from what I've seen anyway, it doesn't really have the readability and accessibility. So I'd certainly, I'd highly recommend the book by Roland Darling as a first starter.
Rob:Yeah, the notebook, really good, really good. I'm going check that one out though that you've just mentioned because I have a deep fascination with Victorian times.
Richard:Oh, this one's perfect for you.
Rob:Ticks all the boxes, notebooks and Victorian times. Perfect. I'm gonna go have a look at that after this episode. Okay. Thank you so much, Richard, joining us today on the Stationery Freaks podcast, and thank you for sharing your system for commonplace and then talking about the collage.
Rob:It was great. Really, really good. Thank you.
Richard:My pleasure. Thanks for asking me.
Rob:No worries. You're absolutely welcome on the show. So with all of our episodes, we have a newsletter that goes out. If you head to stationeryfreaks.com, you will find the podcast and the link to the newsletter. It accompanies every single podcast that we do with, Richard behind the scenes kind of information as well.
Rob:And, of course, you can find us on Instagram at stationery freaks UK. Richard, where can people find you? Did you want to give us your Instagram handle?
Richard:Yeah, Instagram. I'm on my account is f twenty two. It's all in small case letters, no numbers. So small case f and then the number twenty two written out.
Rob:Well, we'll include all the links in the show now and the newsletter. Helen, anything else from you before we close out?
Helen:No, I will save all my purchases that I bought for another day. Maybe I'll even just post them on Instagram, that'll do.
Rob:Well, think Helen, maybe in our next episode, because I've actually bought some more stationary stuff, some really cool stuff I think. So we'll get back to maybe stationary stories in our next episode, Helen.
Helen:Maybe.
Rob:Maybe you shouldn't sound too convinced about that.
Helen:Well, you know, I don't know who listens to this anymore. And I'm worried about outing myself and being in trouble for spending money on stationary I don't need. But you know.
Rob:So you're hinting there that maybe your husband listens to this show.
Helen:My husband does not listen to my other people he knows might.
Rob:I love it. Well, with that, we shall see you and speak to you in the next episode. That's bye bye from me.
Helen:And goodbye from me.
Rob:Thanks again, Richard.
Richard:My pleasure. Thank you.
