Franklin Christoph pen case review

I have a problem.  Not a problem that I need a 12-step program for, but one that does affect my life negatively.  My problem is that I am always losing my stuff.  I can never remember where I leave stuff (home office, work office?), is it in the car, on top of my bookshelf, underneath that stack of dirty gym clothes (gross).  Recently I have been working on fixing that problem by making some minor, sustainable changes in my life, but for now, I am focusing on ways to minimize the effects of my problem.  Especially as it relates to my fountain pens.

The issue of constantly misplacing things is a bad problem for a fountain pen addict to have.  When I start losing pens that cost upwards of $75-100, well, that's not good.  Not to mention all the sample vials, spare Lamy nibs, micromesh pads, and other miscellanea that I've misplaced.  It's not that the stuff is lost, per se.  It's just that I can't find it when I need it.

Enter the Franklin-Christoph (FC) Zippered 20 Pen case.  FC is a well known name in the pen world, at least in the US, so I'm ashamed to admit that this pen case is my first FC product.  I picked it up about a year ago, ordered straight from the FC website for $75 shipped (via Paypal).  I also picked up some discounted prototype notebooks from a test run on the same order (I'm still using those, what a steal!  I'll review those later.).  The FC website is a little bit... umm...  outdated, but I really like ordering straight from the manufacturer, so I'm willing to overlook that, especially since they have quite a variety of FP related products available online.

This is a handsome pen case made of "distressed Saddle Boot leather", as FC calls it.  There are a couple of other leather color choices, as well as size choices, I went for the brown/black and 20 pen capacity.  It looks almost like a book, and at about 10" x 7.5" by 2" it's the size of a large book.  The leather is actual, real leather (for $75, it ought to be) that feels real, no plastic feel here.  The zipper running around the perimeter of the case feels solid and well-attached.

The pen case opens like a book after unzipping it.  Each half of the case is protected from the other by a flap of black material which is lightly padded.  Flipping that black padding back reveals the interior of the pen case, with ten slots on each side.  Pens are secured inside by two black elastic straps.  The straps are very tight, and this is evidently high quality elastic which will likely last longer than the average cheapo elastic that you find in less expensive pen cases.  That's my guess anyways.  There's absolutely no looseness in the vertical direction here, you can wiggle the pens horizontally but under normal carrying circumstances they would not wiggle.  You really have to act with purpose to put a pen in or pull a pen out of the loops.  These elastic straps are TIGHT, folks.

I haven't done a good job of showing it in these pictures, but there's just enough spacing between the elastic pen holding loops that you don't have to worry about your pens contacting each other in the case.  I don't like that the top and bottom loops on each side of the case are pretty squeezed up under the zipper flap, but that's really not a huge deal.  Just put a smaller pen there in those end slots.

 Overall I am very happy with the FC 20 pen case.  I did momentarily think about getting FC's larger 40 pen case, but really I didn't need the larger capacity since I never have more than 20 pens at once.  I'm a user, not a collector, so I just resell pens that I don't use anymore.  I initially thought that the case was pretty pricey ($75) but now, after seeing the quality of the workmanship and reaping the benefits of having all my pens in one place (not lost or strewn out all across my desk and desk drawers), I see that it was money very well spent.