Since the age of fifteen, I’ve been keeping a running goal list. It’s not a New Year’s thing; I update and work on it year-round, but I do use the opportunity at the end of every year to give the list a serious overhaul. The list used to be a long piece of paper that I hung on my wall, but in recent years it became a file on my computer. I recently decided that the computer file is no longer serving my needs appropriately, so I’m going back to paper, but this time it’s going to be in notebook form rather than a long scroll.
About a week ago I began the search for a notebook, which I thought was going to be lengthy because I’m kind of fussy about notebooks. I’m one of the few people on this planet who is not impressed by Moleskine— I tried one before and thought it was too… cold war. Everything about it reminded me of East Germany, which is odd because it’s an Italian company. Not that Italy didn’t go through that period. And not that I’m not a fan of cold war design in most contexts.
Anyway. So then it suddenly occurred to me that someone on Etsy is probably violating Moleskines with all sorts of non-traditional modifications, so I went searching for that, but instead I found an Etsy shop called Flamboyan, and they had some original handmade notebooks I really loved. Turns out, Flamboyan is actually a company in Istanbul who also have a shop on Pasaj, which I discovered is the Turkish version of Etsy. So I shopped around on Pasaj because there was free domestic shipping, and I ended up going for a notebook that was way girlier than I would have expected myself to choose. But I really really love it. The craftsmanship is just exceptional, and if you’re not into girly things, Flamboyan offer notebooks in leather and suede, as well. I really can’t recommend these notebooks enough. They’re also packaged appropriately for giving as gifts, though if you’re not in Turkey it may be a little late to aim for Christmas. Still though, the gift of a beautiful, one-of-a-kind handmade notebook would be welcome at any time of year.