2026 Washington DC Fountain Pen Supershow

Aug 23rd, 2026

August is pretty packed on the pen and stationery events calendar in the US and my schedule includes attending two big ones, starting with the Washington DC Fountain Pen Supershow, which I attended for the second year in a row.

A table covered in a pouch with stickers, a lanyard covered in pins and buttons with name tag for the pen show, and laminated sheet with the Vanness Pen Lounge schedule.

This was my first time attending a pen show with a vendor badge as an assistant for the Vanness Pens and Gentleman Stationer tables and Vanness Pen Lounge.

Fairview Park Marriott

The DC show is hosted at the Fairview Park Marriott hotel with vendors from around the world spread through four different rooms and hallways plus additional rooms for seminars/classes, and an ink testing area. There's a lot of show to see, but since I was volunteering or working through most of the show I didn't spend much time exploring the vendor spaces.

A large banner with an arrow pointing and text 'Even more show this way'

There were several maps and signs posted to help visitors find their way around the show. I got a kick out of the "You Are Here" indicator being a red nib taped to the maps.

Collage of photos of the show hotel showing signage for the four vendor rooms, table maps, and the ink testing tables area.

DC can get pretty hot and humid in August, but my favorite area at this hotel is the Salmon Patio, especially for a quiet breakfast in the morning when it's cooler. I can only imagine what this large water feature and sculpture of salmon swimming upstream would have looked like operating as designed, but I still like hanging out with the leaping fish and wildlife outdoors.

Collage showing the sign for the Salmon Patio, a bird perched on the back of a chair, bees in the potted flowers, and the jumping salmon sculptures.

A wider shot of the jumping salmon sculptures in the outdoor patio area.

The hotel sits in a large complex surrounded by trees and walking paths you can explore for a break from the crowd or evening walk.

Vanness Pen Lounge

Look, someone let an inky octopus onto the seminar schedule! I'm very honored to have been invited by Lisa Vanness to support the Vanness Pen Lounge again, along with Derek of DWRD.net.

Pocket-size laminated schedule of free seminars about Fountain Pen Basics, Ink Swatching, and Notebook Systems in the Vanness Pen Lounge.

The lounge is a large meeting room on the lower floor next to the ink testing tables where show attendees could take a break, ask questions and chat, and attend free seminars throughout the weekend. During the official hours of the lounge at least one of us was around at all times to chat with anyone who stopped in. Derek brings different areas of interest and experience, and we both really enjoyed talking with people over the weekend. Read more about his inaugural visit to the DC pen show on his site.

The sign over the door for the Vanness Pen Lounge meeting room next to the Ink Testing Tables.

The empty Vanness Pen Lounge with eight round conference tables with black table cloths surrounded by chairs.

Is it just me, or are all the chairs staring? We rearranged the room so that the seminars would be held around four-ish tables at one end of the room, with the remaining tables at the other end set up for people to gather around to take a break, try stuff out, and chat anytime, even if a seminar was going on.

Having a relatively quiet place to take a break, and support what seems to be a growing number of newer fountain pen enthusiasts, is a valuable addition to a pen show—especially one as large and potentially overwhelming as DC, and it was my privilege to be a part of it.

Seminars

I had the opportunity to present two sessions of "Finding Your Style" (my free ink swatching seminar) in the Vanness Pen Lounge. These sessions were about an hour long and I aim to balance talking through a range of factors you might consider in your own swatching process (with examples), and some hands-on swatching with a few different types of tools, paper, and inks.

A cardboard box full of small, colorful envelopes.

I don't have an exact count but based on the amount of swatch paper envelopes I have left, a total of 55-60 people participated and I hope everyone left with a little inspiration and at least one new idea to try!

There were also five sessions of the Fountain Pen Basics seminar held throughout the weekend—after Lisa V. hosted the first one, Derek and I took turns leading the remaining sessions throughout the weekend.

The Gentleman Stationer

This year I was able to support The Gentleman Stationer table as an employee, assisting customers while Joe was downstairs in the Vanness Lounge presenting seminars on notebook systems or exploring the show and connecting with other vendors. Some new items for the shop from Laurets and Galen Leather came directly from the show, and I look forward to seeing what other new products arrive over the next months!

The view from behind The Gentleman Stationer table with leather notebook covers, pouches and other pen storage, pens and multipens, bags, etc.

My view from behind the TGS table of what still remained on Sunday morning after a busy Friday and Saturday, where we had notebook systems, pen cases and other accessories, and some standard pens and multi-pens to meet a range of stationery needs.

NFP Designs

Like last year, my first stop on Friday when I had a little time to shop was the NFP Designs tables. I had gotten a small 24 pen box with four drawers that has been great, so this year I was hoping to pick up a second and was not disappointed. These are great for my growing collection of "maker" pens.

A compact wooden box with four drawers with gray liners to hold six pens each, a 4 slot yellow leather pen tray and a 2 slot dark green pen tray.

I also got a 2 pen tray to fill in a gap in another drawer, and a new leather tray in a bold yellow.

Skogsy Pens

I've visited the Skogsy Pens table at a few shows but the last time I was looking at getting one of his signature LVED (low-volume eyedropper) models, another model and material caught my eye and the LVED had to wait for another day. Well, in the days before this show there were photos of some baby LVEDs shared and that immediately went on my short list of things to check out at the show.

A pocket-size Skogsy LVED fountain pen with orange brown ebonite cap filled with dark orange ink, next to a small Rickshaw pen sleeve, silicone grease, and information card.

This is a pretty classic color and material for an LVED, but smol, with an appropriately scaled pen sleeve to match which I of course was delighted by.

Uncapped LVED fountain pen with orange brown ebonite cap and section and clear body, with surfboard design on nib.

I've filled the pen with a matching dark orange/brown Sailor ink called Kohiru.

Hanabi Glass Studio

Lucas of Hanabi Glass Studio encourages picking up and trying the beautiful range of glass pens on his table—however I have a self-imposed restriction that I'm only allowed to pick up at most one per visit, because if I pick it up I will buy it. Joking aside, what I've been looking for has been pretty specific. Last year I wasn't necessarily expecting to buy a glass pen but as these are as much a piece of art as a tool, one pen in particular really caught my eye and felt as good in the hand as it looked on the table so that was a done deal. This year I was specifically looking for one of the smaller italic-style nibs—wide enough to be expressive but a little more practical for a range of uses than the impressive 6mm wide nib!

A hand-made glass pen with a clear handle, shaped grip section and colorful swirl, and an italic style tip, and a colorful glass eyedropper, both from Hanabi Glass Studio.

At this show I also picked out one of his beautiful eyedroppers—despite famously skipping the use of an "eyedropper" to fill an eyedropper pen, I'll make use of this when using the glass pens. He also had a 3D-printed vending machine for a mystery item and I got a very cool and useful pen rest with his Hanabi (fireworks) logo.

A page of writing and sketching with an italic-style glass pen, the glass pen on a glass pen rest with the Hanabi logo, and a colorful glass eyedropper.

Abdiel Acosta Art

I became aware of Abdiel Acosta's art via the paintings corresponding with the latest series of Anderillium inks, the Icthyoformes series, and have passed by his booth at many shows. This time I'd seen that he'd put his octopus art on some Rickshaw pouches, and I can always use more pouches, but couldn't decide on which size so I just got both!

Small and medium zipper pouches from Rickshaw with a painted octopus art design from Abdiel Acosta.

I also ended up with this heart-shaped ceramic pen rest—lots of art to see at his table.

A small ceramic pen rest in the shape of a heart with floral design pressed into the top in a light pink color.

DIY Kaweco

When the DIY Kaweco color was announced as glow-in-the-dark, I was finally in on a DIY color and especially wanted to try mixing and matching the pieces with another recent new color, the Lunar Shadow Green. While the DIY Kaweco experience is scheduled for the On the Paper Trail Live event in Nashville this October, with pens readily available and a brief lull in the schedule on Sunday I went ahead and made one with Lisa Vanness cheering me through the process.

Two hand-operated machines to assemble your own Kaweco sport pen at the Vanness tables and the parts of a DIY glow pen ready to be assembled.

The steps to use the machines are pretty quick and easy, but it's neat to assemble your own pen which even says it's the DIY exclusive on the cap.

An assembled Kaweco DIY Sport Glow Green fountain pen on a wood pen rest.

And here's the mix-and-match fun with the Lunar Shadow Green, currently I'm enjoying swapped sections on these pens.

Uncapped DIY Glow Green and Lunar Green Shadow Kaweco sport pens with swapped sections on a pen rest in daylight.

Uncapped DIY Glow Green and Lunar Green Shadow Kaweco sport pens with swapped sections under UV light so the glow-in-the-dark material is glowing bright green.

Final Thoughts

This was primarily a volunteering, presenting, working show for me rather than a shopping or taking classes show, but I still managed to bring home some new pens and storage that I'm really enjoying. It was nice to see some beautiful, unique pens that I did not bring home. I also really value the opportunity to help people learn more and get questions answered about using fountain pens, swatching inks, finding the right notebook system or notebook, figuring out storage needs, etc. If you attended a seminar in the pen lounge or visited the TGS or Vanness tables at the show, thank you!

In the evenings I enjoyed nice dinners and hanging out in the hotel lobby talking about pens and inks and pen/stationery shows and books and life. It was great to catch up with friends, meet new people, share my new stickers, and have many nice things shared with me.

An A5 zipper pouch/notebook folder made from a reusable shopping bag, a painted ink pony, stickers and trading cards, button, ink swatch card for Kobe Vanness Hummingbird Green, and a roll of zodiac washi tape.

Next up, I leave for San Francisco in a few days!

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