Pelikan M620 Grand Place
By John Mottishaw

From the introduction of plastics in fountain pens beginning with the Le Boeuf, this material has played a key part in the look and function. In the case of the M620, it has been the entire difference between the models. And what a difference it has been.

The M620 first known as the "Cities Series", evoking major centers of world population including Athens, Berlin, and San Francisco, has evolved to include "the world's most famous sites", the most recent of which is the Grande Place in Brussels. This pen celebrates the ascendancy of democracy over monarchy. The area was beautifully restored to its renaissance glory by the professional guilds after it was destroyed by Louis XIV.

Cast plastics have made the finest pens since Dupont provided the first materials to Le Boeuf and Sheaffer's in the early 1920's. Although the material is no longer nitrocellulose, rather a more complex and durable resin, the principles of manufacture are still much the same. A liquid plastic is cast into a rod or sheet, which is then hardened. It is machined and milled into the form of a barrel and a cap. If the material has more than one color and reflectivity, these properties are revealed when the pen is cut from its solid form.

The Grand Place is a rich metallic mix of copper, bronze and silver with a blue ribbon that winds through the flow. Because all of these colors have iridescence, they reflect light differently depending on the angle from which they are seen. This gives the pen a shimmer of lights and darks. Even the section and blind cap, though solid copper color, have this iridescence.
                                          
Each pen is unique in its color signature. Although all share the swirling interaction of color, some are more linear, others have identifying signatures like fully closed ribbons that form "eyes". All are engaging in their complexity. Not since the M620 "San Francisco" have we seen a pen with this much mystery.

Pelikan has made the M620 the showplace for its plastics innovations. In a case like this, not all of the pens are as successful. But, when taken together, this series represents an exploration in color and light texture that is unmatched in the history of fountain pens.

John Mottishaw © September 25 2006