czxwyst Picasso 916 Malage Fountain Pen Original Box New Version (Sunset Gray, Medium Nib 0.7mm)

Preface: I have permanent hand and wrist injuries, and they hurt particularly badly when writing. I have recently started having to write a lot (studying for professional certifications) and have not been able to write with normal pens without severe pain developing within 20 minutes, so I decided to try some new fountain pens with a different weight balance.I read so many good things about this brand. I ordered one Picasso. I loved it. I ordered another. And another. I color-code my notes, so having 5-6 pens is ideal for me. Within two weeks, I owned six different Picasso pens. I thought I’d managed to get it right on the first try. I could actually write for an hour before I felt any pain!About a week after my final Picasso purchase, one of the nibs started to scratch. This was followed by two more. Like I said, I have permanent injuries and my hands & wrists are VERY sensitive to this kind of issue. I tried to make sure the tines were aligned and whatnot. I could not fix the issue. It may not have been a level of scratchy that would cause most to consider the pens completely unusable, but it was painful for me to use within 5 minutes. I pushed for a while, trying to write enough to smooth the nib out, but my body wasn’t having it. It was a hard choice to return them—I actually considered sending these $20-$30 pens to a nibsmith for a minute!—but I decided I’d rather try another brand, maybe something a little higher-end that wasn’t iridium or steel, to see if that worked. (It took a little experimentation, but I think I have a solution now.)I had another iridium-nib pen from another brand with the same issue, except that one had the issue within a week. Maybe it has something to do with iridium in general, or the purity/quality of the iridium used? Three of my Picassos are fine and I still enjoy using them. One of the good ones is the very first pen, which I’ve put to use quite a bit since I got it, so the scratchy nib issue seems pretty random. Anyway. I send my returns off. My wrists hurt badly enough that it was all I could do to box up the pens, and trying to rinse out remaining ink was out of the question.I got a message from the seller asking why I returned three of the six pens. Unsolicited message, but okay, maybe you’re trying to improve your product quality or you’re concerned about a bad lot getting through quality control or something. So I wrote a very polite response stating that half were fine and I still loved them, but half had turned scratchy, I didn’t know why, I’ve used the same paper and inks, and I take care of my pens, so I don’t know what happened. I did not mention my injury, as it wasn’t really relevant at the time. I returned the three pens because they had turned scratchy. I replied to the Amazon email because it was supposed to make my response anonymous.I just received a weird threatening message from the seller. I’m just going to paste it:“ok, thank you. I see, I will check every your returned pen to see if they worked like you said. For few customers abused Amazon's return rules recently, vicious returned multiple items which are all no problems. We help Amazon to collect the evidence, hope you can understand it, thanks a lot.“Obviously I’m pretty creeped out. I tried to be reasonable and nice. I was polite and went out of my way to try to provide helpful information when an unsolicited seller inquiry landed in my inbox. I genuinely wanted to help. And then I got that threat. Obviously I have reported it to Amazon as well because I don’t want them doing that to anyone else. But I’m also posting here so you’ll know what you’re dealing with if you happen to need to return a thing, or if you happen to have similar injuries that force you to be picky about pen performance.

I absolutely *love* this pen! I've been dabbling in fountain pens for about two decades now, though recently was when I really got into them and "fell down the rabbit hole" that is the wonderful world of fountain pens and ink. I was searching for my "everyday carry" (EDC) and although I had several pens that were nice (Pilot Metropolitan, Sheaffer Award, Lamy AL-Star), it wasn't until I got this one that I sighed the big happy sigh of relief.This pen is literally everything I could ask for: slim, fantastic soft textured surface, matte black with gorgeous red trim, and writes the smoothest of any pen I've ever used. AND the price is insanely low, to boot!By comparison, for my birthday I bought myself a $90 Cross fountain pen. And then took it back...it just didn't write well. Tried many more; nope. This Picasso 918 I didn't have high hopes for, being only $18, but it was too gorgeous to pass up. Now I want several, just to be sure I always have one on hand.I have zero complaints about this pen. Currently I'm using Waterman Intense Black and it works perfectly. Smooth, no skips, no hard starts, just amazing writing, all the time. I'm attaching samples to demonstrate just how beautifully this pen writes.Also, I have small hands (I wear boys' winter gloves because women's gloves are too big for me) and this pen is just right. My "Goldilocks" pen for sure. I am also big on texture, and this pen's smooth, satiny, velvety finish is just perfect. Last night I couldn't stop playing with it, just turning it in my hands because it felt that good. (For those of us with ASD, that's HUGE!)You really can't go wrong with this pen, unless you have really big hands and this pen might be too small. I use it posted and it's almost like it was custom-made for my hand. It's also lightweight without feeling cheap; easy to carry in my purse without adding bulk or weight. Fabulous!I really can't say enough good things about this pen. Love it!

It’s a good pen. My only concern is how easily the paint comes off. See the picture. This is from simply using the pen over the course of 6 months. I would expect it to be able to hold up better. No other concerns than that. It writes and writes well, so it does what it’s supposed to do. But don’t expect it to stay looking sharp.

I bought this pen because I had to have 2! So, I'm not a fountain pen connoisseur so I cannot compare this to a different pen/company but I can say that I absolutely love this pen!! Writes beautifully and smooth. Fine point but can be a bit bolder depending on how you hold/apply pressure. Very easy to fill. The is my second Picasso pen because I loved the first one soooo much.

I'm not going to go on and on about this fountain pen except to say...this pen is not the quality they claim. It is suppose to be a ULTRA-FINE-POING Nib but it's no where close to that. Mine writes like a 0.7 mm or a 1.0 mm. Sometimes thicker than that! I have tried 3 name brand and high-end fountain pen cartridges in this pen and there is no difference in either one of them. It writes kind of rough too which is really disgusting and disappointing. I'm just sitting around waiting for it to leak and my life will be complete. I just do not like it when seller's advertise their product to be something it's not. This is nothing more than lying to the customer just to make a sale and it is also fraudulent advertising! The best pen for your money is a Pilot Kakuno Extra-Fine Nib, and a Monteverde Rima FP Model MV42346 Black Ink & Extra-fine Nib. The Monteverde is a fine writing instrument and will give you years and years of service. I have 3 of them and all 3 are the best pens I've ever owned...even better than Mont Blanc!!! I write a lot and I have to have a pen that is effortless to hold and a pleasure to write with.