Over the last couple of years, I’ve been seeing Shinola notebooks for sale in more and more places. Some stores have a big wooden display rack exclusively for this brand. Shinola is best known for their watches, but they also make bicycles and leather goods. They are also renowned for their commitment to helping revive Detroit by basing their company there and making products in the USA, with American parts wherever possible.

Shinola makes hardcover and softcover journals in various sizes, as well as some leather notebook covers. I picked up a small softcover notebook in a charcoal grey cover. This was actually purchased in 2015, but from what I’ve seen in stores, the same model is still available and presumably is basically unchanged, other than any minor manufacturing variations that can occur.

The packaging is pretty standard: shrinkwrap, then a paper band with branding info. The outside of the notebook itself has a cloth-texture which I think is just paper rather than actual linen. The covers are fairly thin– not floppy but not as thick as some other softcovers I’ve tried.

The size is 3.75″ x 5.5″, so slightly wider than a pocket Moleskine (shown below for comparison). Interestingly, on the back of the notebook, they correctly translate the dimensions in inches to 9.52 x 13.97 cm, but on their website, they claim that 3.75 x 5.5″ equals 8 x13cm!

On the inside front cover there is a space for writing personal info. You also see a bit of the tape used to strengthen the binding– in most softcovers this is hidden. The inside back cover has a paper pocket, which seemed a little skimpy to me, as it doesn’t run the full height of the notebook. Mine also seemed to have some extra glue that leaked out in one corner, and an odd texture along the top of both sides of the inside back cover, as if something had been crushed in there when the notebook was clamped shut for trimming, but later removed.

The notebook doesn’t open quite as flat as some, due to a fairly thick layer of glue on the spine to hold the sewn signatures together. Other than the odd mark in the inside back cover, the only quality issue I noticed was that the elastic closure was attached a bit unevenly, which makes it run on a slant across the front cover. Not a huge deal, but I tend to notice whenever anything isn’t square and symmetrical!

I chose the unlined paper, which is lightly less buttery in color than Moleskine paper, but still has a warm ivory tone. It is smooth, but not as smooth as Moleskine or Rhodia paper– there is a very slight tooth. It doesn’t feel rough with fine point pens, but wetter pens can feather out slightly. Inks seemed to dry quickly on this paper– the Lamy was dry in under 5 seconds. Show-through was average and bleed-through was a little better than average, though some wider/wetter fountain pens did bleed a little in spots. I would call it ok for fountain pens, but not totally great.

That is kind of my overall impression of this notebook: ok, but not totally great. It’s fine, and I really like the color and texture of the cover, but the most exciting thing about this notebook is that it is 100% made in the USA, including all components such as paper, ribbon markers, etc. And it’s only $12, which seems a very reasonable price for a notebook of this quality made in the USA. You can purchase directly from Shinola’s website or at many local stationery/office supply stores.