2026 San Francisco Pen Show Highlights

September 13th, 2026

2026 has been a busy year, in no small part due to a lot of pen show travel. I wanted to return to the San Francisco Pen Show to see the unique mix of vendors and people that can be found at this show.

View of thin band of sunrise orange from the window of an airplane.

Even so, other than a short list of objectives and a couple class/seminar reservations, I didn't go into this show with too much of a plan. When I wasn't visiting and shopping at other vendors you could find me with the crew behind the Vanness Pens table, mostly helping people pick out leather goods from Galen (I might have picked out a new pocket pen sleeve for my lanyard myself).

Badge for Olive Octopus, Vanness Pen Shop on a San Francisco Pen Show lanyard with two pen sleeves attached.

Here are some highlights from the show, mostly in the form of a photo dump and new items I picked up for myself.

Bayfront Park & Walking Trail

I missed crossing through the Westin and going out to the Bayfront Park and the walking trail along the water with a view of the airport when at the show in 2024, but I made up for it this year by walking several miles along the paths over the course of the weekend. When I got home and started going through photos I was amused to find there were a lot more planes, birds, and flowers than pens or inks. I could have made this the whole post, but I've contained it to a few collage images instead.

Collage of views of SFO airport and San Francisco from Bayshore Park.

Collage of flowers, birds, bridge, and buildings around the Bay Trail.

Also, I don't know what the story is here but there seemed to be some bird drama going on.

Collage of four wide photos stacked vertically showing two birds having a face off in shallow water with one bird walking away in the final frame.

On the Paper Trail Podcast Panel

I arrived early Thursday and after getting checked in I took a walk along the trail and got lunch before meeting up with some people in the Westin lobby until it was time for the On the Paper Trail podcast panel. Joe and Lisa were joined by Ian of Schon DSGN, Iris of Glassophy, and Daryl of Musubi for a discussion about the Art of Creation.

Live podcast recording with Ian Schon, Joe Crace, Lisa Vanness, Iris Au, and Daryl Lim.

There's a lot from this panel discussion that stuck with me and got me thinking, it's available to watch/listen to as Episode 15 of the On the Paper Trail podcast. I already had something created by each of the panel guests, but also visited their tables at the show and came home with something new from each of them.

Schon DSGN

One popular new release at this show was the "Lil' Dipper" metal dip pen nib from Schon DSGN. Inkdependence Mike was behind the table all weekend demoing these, which sold out Sunday morning.

The Schon DSGN table with demo pens of the Lil' Dipper metal dip pen nib with multiple colors of Pocket Six pens visible in the background.

This fishy design is a little different from other available metal dip nibs—including that it's threaded for a Jowo #6 section instead of going in a traditional dip-nib holder or using a proprietary threading. There's a slit down the middle that can be adjusted slightly with an allen wrench where the ink flows, instead of multiple channels running around the outside to the tip, and a few different writing surfaces but this is not a nib you would rotate to use all the ink like with a typical glass pen or something like the Kakimori metal nibs.

Closeup of the Lil' Dipper metal dip nib.

I look forward to trying this out. Spoiler alert, this is just the start of what was pretty much an "oops all dip nibs" show for me.

Glassophy

When I attended this show in 2024, my first stop as soon as the show opened on Friday was to one of the small side rooms with glass pen vendors. In the first few minutes of the show I was able to get a small glass fox pen from Glassophy with a bent fude-like tip, which is a treasured piece in my glass pens collection.

A small green fox made out of glass with a pen nib tail, multicolor glass pen with fude-style tip, sticker of fox holding a pen, and pen box that says Glassophy, Glass dip pen created with love.

At this show I picked out a beautiful full size pen with a similar tip.

Closeup of multicolor glass pen with angled fude-like tip.

Musubi

Musubi introduced a new paper at this show and I was able to test it out and hear from Daryl about how it was made, a thick but not bulky paper for pocket notebooks that's fountain pen friendly and surprisingly light.

A Musubi pocket notebook with tape binding.

A generous friend shared the notebook with the new paper that Musubi were not yet selling but giving away with certain notebook purchases so I'll have a chance to spend some more time getting to know this paper.

Yamamoto Paper

One of the things that has stuck with me most from any pen show experience was taking the Yamamoto Paper seminar two years ago. I've been interested in paper long before I found the world of fountain pens and inks. I made sure I reserved a spot to attend this year's seminar as soon as they were available. I also visited the table and got a new paper samples box, A4 sheets of the new Kin Kaku Den paper, some black correspondence paper, and a couple pocket Ro-biki notebooks—one of which I used for notes during the show.

Looseleaf paper, black correspondence paper with 2 metallic Pilot Juice pens, a small box with square sample paper packs, two Ro-biki pocket notebooks with translucent covers, stack of papers with writing and ink tests.

It's been really neat to learn more about the paper industry and paper manufacturing directly from Taizo Yamamoto, and have the opportunity to tell him in person how much I enjoy using so many different types of papers via the A4 paper packs, paper tasting kits, Ro-biki and other notebooks/notepads (a lot of which we carry at TGS).

Looseleaf papers, sample papers with writing and ink tests, pocket notebook on desk during paper seminar.

Drillog

I backed the original Drillog Kickstarter where I got the 0.5 and 0.8 Drillog metal dip nibs, holders, etc. but did not have much success in getting the 0.5 tip to work at all or the 0.8 to work consistently so they've gone unused for years. I've mostly had good luck with the Kickstarter campaigns I've supported, but this one was a disappointment. They made changes from those first nibs to the "2.0" versions, and I did see significant improvement when someone let me test theirs out.

Nine metal Drillog dip nib test pens with test paper, metal ink well, and rinse water.

One of the objectives I had at this show was to see if I wanted to try again with Drillog or just get rid of the nibs and holders I had and be done. They were offering discounts for people who brought their Drillog pens to show, and I could try the full range of the new nibs including the unique "Kodachi" that is bent to lay down both fine and quite wide lines.

Uncapped green Drillog metal pen with yellow and brown fude Drillog metal dip nib.

After talking to them and trying the new nibs, I ended up getting the Kodachi nib to go in my existing holder, passed along the second holder, and will move forward to see how this one works out for me.

Closeup of yellow and brown fude Drillog metal dip nib.

Glass Studio Aun

Another objective I had for this show was to visit the Glass Studio Aun table and talk to them about getting a couple Aun pens I have that had chipped/broken nibs repaired. One of the pens I'd gotten at the show in 2024, and the other I was able to order online from a US vendor. They were able to re-shape the tip of one pen to a broader size than it had been originally at the show, I left it with them and picked it up a few hours later. The other one I left with them to take back to Japan and repair in a way where it would remain as a medium tip.

Closeup of yellow and blue glass dip nib pen with broad tip made by Glass Studio Aun.

They did not charge me for the repairs, I will just need to pay the return shipping from Japan for the one pen, which is more than fair. I'm glad to have one of these pens back in the rotation now and the other one returning soon. Glass pens are my favorite for sketching, especially on my Col-o-dex cards, and I like using the varied line widths and shapes of the different glass pens as I practice drawing.

Inky Converters

I picked up some more ink and stationery themed pins, stickers, and washi from Inky Converters, as you do.

A roll of Stationyary washi tape with cartoon cats, 3D enamel sakura pin with floating blossoms inside, small yellow ink bottle pin, stickers with sakura ink bottle and SF pen show sticker.

Hatchimonjiya

Inks were long gone by the time I made it to the Hatchimonjiya table, but I enjoyed looking at the swatches anyway. I picked up one of their special edition Life notebooks, some new ink-resist swatching cards, and a strangely-shaped glass swatching tool to try out.

A5 Life Noble Note Section notebook with yellow cover and metallic foil design, pack of ink resist swatching cards, and small glass swatching tool with one curved end and a ball on the other end.

Pineberry Paper

I liked the sticker designs at Pineberry Paper a lot—I picked out several but these are the two sheets I'm keeping for me, plus the bonus sticker they had for the show.

Two sheets of stickers of cute purple dragons and neutral florals plus a vinyl sticker of a teddy bear drinking boba tea and carrying a shopping bag, all from Pineberry Paper.

Reytorra

The "stationery" vendors that were largely in the separate Bayshore room (which was used for classes when I attended in 2024) had tables packed with stickers, washi, stamps, etc... and people. Even during less busy hours it was impossible to take it all in, but one booth that caught my eye was Reytorra. I picked out a sticker sheet and mystery sticker pack, but also a little spiral-bound memo notebook that I thought was really neat.

Sheet of small stickers, mystery pack of large stickers, and small spiral bound memo notebook with black birds on the cover all from Reytorra.

The one demo I looked through had washi tape catalogued on the pages, I'm not 100% sure what I'll end up using this for yet but I've been considering several ideas.

Small spiral memo book open to pages showing room to write name and a memo for a collection of things.

Inks

Unlike DC, I did come home with a few bottles of ink from this show. First, the Colorverse show ink for 2026 called PIER 39, a dark brown with sheen inspired by the infamous sea lions.

Bottle and swatch of Colorverse PIER 39 ink, a dark brown with some green sheen.

Tori of Stationery Universe had shimmer and non-shimmer versions of a new deep purple ink, Lavender Nocturne—there's a longer "things that happen at a pen-show story" here but I brought home the shimmer version of this beautiful shade of ink.

Bottle with wax seal lid and swatch of Stationery Universe Lavender Nocturne shimmer ink, a dark purple with pink shimmer.

The third ink we had to try out at the bar in the after hours since this shimmery pink Glassophy exclusive Re:Born ink is UV-reactive!

Collage of Glassophy Re:Born pink ink with shimmer in normal light and reacting to glow bright white under UV light.

Ahnitol

My pen crab army increases by one with the addition of a blue-black crab, plus a new cuttlefish friend!

A small blue-black crab pen holder and a translucent white and pink cuttlefish pen holder.

French Link Stitch Class

I've started dabbling in making my own notebooks but so far they've only been single signature, thin notebooks. We can find YouTube videos to learn just about anything these days, but with several stitch binding classes hosted by Cheryl Ball at the show I took advantage of the opportunity to learn a new skill in person.

A collage from a French Link Stitch bookbinding class showing materials like scissors, rulers, bone folder, waxed thread, etc. and a finished notebook.

I successfully made a notebook! I managed to flip the cover so the colors I intended for the front ended up inside but overall it was a success and as a bonus I've got a new-to-me paper to try out too.

Closeup of French Link Stitch binding in a 10 signature (plus covers) handmade notebook.

Rickshaw Bagworks

A big new release at the show was the Rickshaw version of the Nock Co. Brasstown pen roll case which I saw briefly before they sold out, but the item I picked up for me was a plush "pen-pillow" that's been on my list and they had a fun yellow shade available that I snagged right at the end of the show.

A plush pen pillow pen rest from Rickshaw in golden yellow.

Final Thoughts

I always bring home a bunch of stickers and gifts from vendors, friends, and new people I met, and this was no exception. It seemed like there were a lot more people I knew and more hanging out at this show compared to DC—it was great to spend time with people, though there's never enough time to see everyone.

A mix of stickers and a floral ink painting spread out on a desk.

Most of the SF show takes place in the Westin, but rooms at the show rate and some pen show events were held at the adjacent Aloft hotel across the parking lot. (Including Karaoke night—what happens at Karaoke night stays in Karaoke night!) This year they also had the ink-testing stations available around the bar and lounge areas of the Aloft so people didn't have to fight the show crowds and could test inks after hours which was nice.

One last funny thing—I stayed at the Aloft again, and there was a room available for me to check in early, but it was in the back-of-beyond in a distinctly different section of the hotel (they weren't kidding about it being far from the elevators).

A collage of images showing a normal hallway in a hotel and then a more bare hallway with plain walls and stairs, a floor plan graphic, window shade with many numbers arranged in long rows, and wallpaper showing a repeating old gas station with random things like a giraffe and UFOs.

You can see how the decor changed from the main part of the hotel to the section I was in, it was a few steps (or loooooong ramp) down from the rest of the floor and the floor diagram by the elevators didn't even go that far, lol. There were interesting choices made for the pattern on the window shades and the wallpaper of the bathroom—it was fine but I certainly have had some fun joking about the liminal space feeling like the backrooms and/or that I was meant to be solving some kind of video game puzzle. I do appreciate a table in a hotel room though.

A small oval table next to a curved couch with some throw pillows in a hotel room.

Anyway, that's a wrap of pen show travel for me this year, but there's one more big event I'm looking forward to in about a month but no weird hotel backrooms this time—I can sleep in my own bed! Will I see you On the Paper Trail: Live in Nashville?

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