When I posted my first Hahnemühle sketchbooks review several years ago, the brand wasn’t that easy to find in the US, except for their artist papers. Fortunately, this has changed and Hahnemühle sketchbooks are now more widely available at Amazon, Blick and other retailers. The company contacted me to offer some samples of their various sketchbooks, so let’s take a look at all these goodies!

Hahnemühle Watercolour Book

First off, the Watercolour Book. This is an “A6″ (actual dimensions 4 1/4 x 6 1/16”) portrait sketchbook with a lightly textured 200 GSM watercolor paper. I love the unusual textured charcoal grey cloth they used on the cover. At 60 pages, it is nicely slim, and even though the size is a little larger than my usual favorite size, it has attractive proportions and offers a little more real estate on the page while still being very portable. I tested my Winsor and Newton artist grade watercolors and the paper held up well, with no significant buckling. Colors are vibrant, and the pens I tested worked well too. The list price is $17.49, and Amazon currently has it available at $14.00. (Buy at Amazon. Other sizes and landscape orientation also available.)

Hahnemühle Report & Art Book

Next is the Report & Art Book. I guess the name indicates it is a reporter style top opening notebook, but the paper inside is plain, so it can be used in landscape format as well. The red stitching adds a cute detail to the exterior. One other distinguishing characteristic is the fold-back cover. Inside are 64 sheets of 130 GSM paper with a fairly smooth texture. The pocket in the back is a bit small compared to the size of the notebook, which again is said to be A6, but is actually 4 3/8 x 5 15/16″. This paper is toothier and I found it a bit rough an draggy with fountain pens, but they are certainly useable, and didn’t bleed or feather. The Acculiner and Super Sharpie did bleed a little, and I saw more show-through on this paper than with the other sketchbooks in this review. But I still think it’s a pretty good paper for basic sketching with most pencils or pens. The prices I’m seeing online for this are around $20 and up, which seems a bit high to me compared to some of the other items in this review. (Amazon only seems to have the A5 size.)

Hahnemühle Nostalgie Sketch Book

The Nostalgie Sketch Book, appropriately, has a very classic feel with a squared off spine and squared corners. (A6, but dimensions are 4 3/8 x 6″) The cover is wrapped with a grey textured paper that sort of has the look of a coarse woven fiber. This has 80 pages of 190 GSM paper with a smooth texture designed for finely detailed ink drawings. I loved the feel of writing in this sketchbook– fountain pens work beautifully, and nothing bleeds through, except for a little spot where I held the Acculiner in place for 5 seconds. This is one of the best papers I’ve tested for show-through, bleed-through, and fountain pen friendliness. The list price for this size is $16.95. (Buy at Amazon. Other sizes also available.)

Hahnemühle Grey Book

The Grey Book is aptly titled, as the cover is grey and the inside pages are also grey. The cover features a sort of wood-grain texture but you see the fibers in the paper, so it also sort of looks like grey flannel. It is an A5 size (6 x 8 7/16″), with 80 pages of smooth 120 GSM paper. I was happy to have a chance to play with my white gel ink pen and marker, as well as using black and white pastels to create shading and highlights. Obviously colored fountain pen inks are not the intended use, but most fountain pens will work pretty well on this paper with zero bleed-through or show-through, but maybe a tiny bit of feathering with really wet inks. I’ve seen prices online ranging from $7.50 to $15 for this size. (Buy at Amazon: A5 or A4. They also make a version with light brown paper, called the Cappuccino Book.)

Hahnemühle Diary Flex

Finally we have the Diary Flex. This notebook features a refillable cover. Inserts can be purchased with blank, lined or dotted pages. The design is quite attractive, with a black faux-leather textured cover and red accents. The inside of the cover has slots for business cards or credit cards, and papers can be tucked in the front and back cover pockets. The top and bottom of the spine are notched so that the headband of the insert shows– this may make the spine less likely to wear at the corners but I can’t decide if I like it. I also don’t love how the elastic closure is anchored at the spine– this leaves the loop flapping around with no place to tuck it out of the way. The paper inside is very smooth, with an ivory tone. At 100 GSM, it feels quite substantial as you turn the pages. The paper feels very smooth and I expected fountain pens to do really well, and for the most part, they did. Just a tiny bit of bleed and feathering only when pressing down to really flex the nib.

The cover and its included refill sell for around $16-20 at most retailers, and the refill notebooks alone are around $7. These seem like a good value, but I’m not sure if the cover is special enough to merit refilling. I do like it, and it seems sturdy enough to last a while, but to me, the point of a refillable notebook is to have a cover made of leather or something that will break in and become more loveable over time, like a Filofax or a Traveler’s Notebook. The refills can’t be used on their own unless you want to look at a very unfinished cardboard exterior with mesh on the spine. But maybe there are other covers that would be compatible? The size is about 4 1/2 x 7 1/2″, so it is an unusual size, but maybe close enough to a Travelers Notebook if you don’t mind a wider cover overhang. (Buy at Amazon.)

Conclusion

All of these Hahnemühle notebooks feel really solidly made, with good attention to detail. They all have more cover overhang than I personally prefer, but everything is symmetrical and squared off and the construction seems precise and high quality. And because Hahnemühle is first and foremost a paper company, they know how to deliver specific paper types that will please artists as well as casual users. Like Stillman and Birn, Hahnemühle offers different textures, weights and colors to work with a range of art media. For me, the Nostalgie and Watercolour books will definitely be in my to-be-used pile, and the Grey Book will also be fun for more experimentation. I’m really pleased with these Hahnemühle sketchbooks and look forward to seeing more of their products in the US market. Check out their website for more details on their various offerings.

Giveaway!

The folks at Hahnemühle also sent me a pack of their Travel Booklets (they’re part of my review from a few years ago), which I will be giving away to a lucky reader:

The giveaway prize is this brand-new, in-wrapper two-pack of Travel Booklets, plus, as a bonus, I will throw in the Diary Flex and Report & Art notebooks tested in this review– just a couple of pages in the back have been used for my pen tests, but they are otherwise in like-new condition.

I will pick one winner from entries received in any of these ways:

On Twitter, tweet something containing “Hahnemühle Sketchbooks @NotebookStories @Hahnemuehle”, and follow @NotebookStories and @hahnemuehle

On Facebook, “like”  the Notebook Stories page and the Hahnemuhle page, and post something containing the words “Hahnemühle Sketchbooks” on the Notebook Stories page.

On Instagram, follow @Notebook.Stories and @Hahnemuehle_global and comment on my Hahnemühle giveaway post, tagging a friend and adding a hashtag of your favorite adjective describing the Hahnemühle notebook. (Example: “@myfriendsally #fountainpenfriendly”)

On your blog, post something containing the words “Hahnemühle Sketchbooks” and “Notebook Stories” and link back to this post, also leaving a comment below with the link in case the trackback doesn’t work.

Please note that the prize can only be shipped to a US address. The deadline for entry is Friday June 14, 2019 at 11:59PM, EST. Please allow a couple of weeks for me to announce a winner. Good luck everyone!