Andy and Tim have wrested control of the show back away from the devious (yet iconic) duo of Johnny and Charlotte, and we’re talking once again to Noah Bier from Makers Cabinet about their brand new Kickstarter project, a pencil extender called The Ferrule.
Show Notes and Links
Our Guest
Noah Bier, Co-founder
Makers Cabinet
Your Hosts
Johnny Gamber
Pencil Revolution
@pencilution
Andy Welfle
Woodclinched
@awelfle
Tim Wasem
@TimWasem
(Download)
Episode transcript:
Johnny: If Michael Jordan was on the globe Trotters, that's my health game.
Tim: Yeah. Okay. Well, yeah, whatever.
Johnny: I only barely understand what that statement means.
**Erasable theme music**
Andy: Hello, welcome to Episode 161 of The Erasable Podcast. I'm Andy Welfle and I'm here with my comrades in graphite, Tim Wasem and Johnny Gamber. Hey guys.
Tim: Hey Andy!
Johnny: Hey Andy!
Andy: Hey! Well, we wrested control of the Erasable airwaves away from the evil yet iconic duo of Johnny and Charlotte. That was, that was pretty great.
Tim: We’ll get you next time, Johnny and Charlotte
Johnny: She made me do it
Andy: Deviously cute. Later we're going to catch up with Noah Bier from Makers Cabinet (the folks who created the Høvel sharpener) about their new pencil focused product on Kickstarter. But first let's talk about the tools of the trade - Tim, what are you writing with and consuming?
Tim: Well, the most important thing I'm consuming - which has just been really awesome and I'm trying to savor it as much as possible - is the new Hemingway documentary by Ken Burns.
Andy: Mmm?
Johnny: Oh, he didn't finish it yet?
Tim: I know, we subscribe to the PBS Documentaries channel on Amazon
Johnny: Oh, neat.
Tim: Yeah, it's like four bucks a month or something and it's just the easiest way to get all those together because I just watch them all the time. So yeah, I've watched the first one and I'm halfway through the second one and I seriously, I'm like - they're so long. I mean it's like six hours total and I'm watching them like 30 minutes at a time or something like that, but it is so good. So Johnny you've seen the whole thin?.
Johnny: Yeah. You can get a PBS passport for like six bucks, I think, a month and have, like everything on PBS. It's like -
Tim: You won't sleep anymore
Johnny: It's not spoilers - the middle one was rough because you know, his life was rough at that point. Like whenever you read a Hemingway bio, you're like, Ohhhhhhh,
Tim: Yeah.
Johnny: Like pre-midlife “he's a jerk” thing coming on.
Tim: Yeah.
Johnny: But I thought it was really balanced. What did you think?
Tim: Yeah. I think he's doing a really good job and he's - it makes it super easy. It makes everything feel new, like the information feels new that you're getting.
I also liked that it doesn't have like Rose colored glasses or whatever, where he'll just be like, here's a bunch of lies he used to tell about himself, you know? Like he used to say that he did this, he didn't, he used to say that he did this - he didn't, you know? So I liked that part of it. And I was a little afraid that they were going to like spend too much time on like when he was a little kid or something, but I think they sped through that right -
Andy: Nobody cares about that.
Tim: Right at the perfect -
Johnny: They really did.
Tim: Perfect pace and a lot of interesting focus on his mom - because everybody always talks about his dad because his dad and him, you know, died the same way. So she usually gets a little less attention it seems like. And so they talked a lot about his mom and like they had such a crazy relationship.
I loved it. And also there's just tons of like manuscript pictures that are just really awesome. Like lots of close-ups on pencil manuscripts and shots of his desk and all that good stuff. So, can't go wrong.
Andy: Any pictures of old pencils hanging around?
Tim: I haven’t found any yet. Johnny's further - he's through it, I haven't seen any, but
Johnny: Yeah, you can’t identify them though.
Andy: Mm
Johnny: They had access to the house in Cuba, which was pretty awesome. Did a lot of cool, like long shots with the sunlight coming in the windows.
Tim: That's very cool. I heard the other day - and this might be later in the documentary - but I saw it on Twitter and it blew me away. I learned that in 1936 Hemingway's rate that he got paid was like a dollar per word
Andy: In 1936?!
Tim: In 1936, So that means that if he wrote a 1000 word feature I mean, in today's money, I read that that's like equivalent of writing 1000 word - I think I said page - but 1000 word feature and getting like, $19,000.
Andy: Wow.
Tim: Yeah. And like the same person who was sharing that had said that like the amount of money he made just from reporting on the Spanish Civil War, bought him that crazy house. Like
Andy: Wow.
Tim: It's insane. But so yeah, that documentary is very good and I can't wait to finish it, but I'm definitely not rushing through it and I'll watch it again I'm sure, but I'm just kind of savoring it
And I am reading The Sympathizer, which has been staring at me from my shelf for a long time cause I got it for a really good deal and just have been meaning to get to it but didn't really. I didn't really have a great understanding of what it was about cause I just hadn't looked too closely, because I just buy books so often.
And then I heard it mentioned on - the guys were talking about on Take Note and it was almost like it just yelled for me off the shelf and I picked it up and I think the thing that put me over the edge is that they - Adam described it as a spy novel and I was like, “Oh, a spy novel sounds really good right now.” And so I picked it up, but it's very good - the authors name is - I'm not sure I'm pronouncing it right, I'm probably butchering that -
Andy: I think it's just Nguyen (New-enn)
Tim: Nguyen, ok, so he won - this book won the Pulitzer Prize several years ago so, it's awesome.
It's written from the perspective of the guy who's in jail and he's writing it as his confession for something. So a lot of energy and yeah, it's very cool, a lot of good sentences in there. I'm enjoying that a lot.
Andy: They use letters in a very good order.
Tim: He's very good at using the letters in order. Yeah. Put words together, make sentences. So is that a - Tommy boy, top to bottom, left to right put words together to make sentences
It's called reading - I pull that line out of my students at least once a semester.
But, and then as far as listening, this is another recent find, but I went to like a thrift store in town and went to the records - which is always full of garbage, you know? - it's always lots of like really disturbing, slightly disturbing Christmas albums and Hebr Albert and Tijuana brass and obscure classical record, but I found like a perfect copy of “The Best of the Everly Brothers”.
Which is one of those groups that I hear is like, you know, all the early Ronk’n’Rolll bands or like the 60s bands were like influenced by them when they were younger and stuff. And, I bought it and we have been like wearing it out on the turntable.
It's like, you know, they did the songs like “Bye-Bye Love” - remember that song?
Andy: Yeah.
Tim: So it's like kind of their big hit, but it's a great album and it's a really good like palate cleanser to have playing in the house in the background. And it's a lot less dorky than you remember it being probably.
All right and I am writing with a - because of the Hemingway documentary, I'm using a very handsome cat pencil that I bought at Hemingway's house in Key West.
Andy: Complete with a little cat butthole.
Tim: It has a big cat butt hole. It is a little hand carved wooden cat that's painted that is posted on the top of this pencil, which is also painted and decorated, and it's a beautifully sharpened with a Høvel
And it is almost unusable because of the weight of the cat on the top and the horrifying state of this graphite. But, you know, I thought it was a sensible choice and I am using an erasable podcast, ledger from Write Notepads.
Johnny: Ooh nice
Tim: Yeah. I found an old one that has like, 20 random pages at the end that I forgot that I didn't use and so I'm finishing it off right here. So that's me. How about you Johnny?
Johnny: Nice! So from Less’s last Zine “Useful Journaling, 1.3” I was sort of going back to the books about journal writing, so I picked up “How to Make a Journal of your Life” by Dan Price. Have you guys seen this book?
Tim: No, never heard of it.
Johnny: It's the opposite of Ryder Carroll. It's a lot of like, “Hey, you don't write sad stuff in this book write that in another book”, I'm like, ah, that's a lot of books
But it, it was interesting. It's like a Zine, like the whole thing is handwritten, but it turns out he's like a famous scenester also, so I wish I'd known that going in - I would have appreciated it more, maybe found some stuff to copy.
And I just read a book that I got for Christmas called “Burning the Books” that was by... his name escapes me (*Richard Ovenden*) - he's the librarian at the Bodleian at Oxford it's about like collecting knowledge and libraries and archives, and also historical attempts to destroy and suppress knowledge.
So it was really, really good. One of those, like “ooh I better ration this out” books, except that the cover looked like burned paper, in a way that was really just kind of disgusting. So, like, I hope they put a better cover on the paperback because I had a lot of trouble finding reviews of it - like nobody touched it - but he's like a big deal.
And I read “On Earth we’re Briefly Gorgeous” by Ocean Vuong whose name I hope I'm not mispronouncing. Do you guys like his poetry?
Andy: Beyond that, that title poem.
Johnny: Yeah he's like the best at titles?
Andy: Yeah.
Johnny: Everything - all his poems, his books - they're perfect. I don't know how autobiographical it was, but parts of it were very hard to read, but also hard to put down. So definitely a good book to check out. I think Amazon had it for like 10 bucks? Like can't beat it.
And I'm - like Tim - I'm just engrossed in the Hemingway documentary.
And I've been obsessed with Muse lately, which will show up probably in this months. Patreon playlist. I forgot how ridiculously good they are.
And I'm writing with a Generals Test Scoring 580, which is such a damn good pencil on this nice, smooth field notes paper, which is the winter edition because the spring edition is still missing.
Andy: Nice.
Johnny: Awkward silence.
Andy: That's all right. Just pulling up mine. What do I have going on? I've been reading a lot of books lately. I finished a couple of them. One is a book called “Four Lost Cities” by Annalee Newitz and they're an author - they live in San Francisco. I think not too far from where I am.
I talked about their novel “The History of an Alternate Timeline” before. Yeah, which was really good. And I watched a Zoom book club meeting about this book. And Annalee Newitz is one of the founders of Io9, which was one of the Gawker Science Fiction blogs and they are a science writer.
So in addition to writing science fiction, they have gone and reported on visited archeology sites and reported on four different cities in the history of mankind and they talk about Pompei, they talk about, oh, I, I do not know how to pronounce it, but it is a... oh, I'm going to pull up the thing here, a neolithic site called Çatalhöyük in central Turkey, which is several millennia old. They talk about Pompei. They talk about the city of Angkor and old Cambodia and something that is where St. Louis is today, which was a big mountain city called Cahokia. And just tells a bunch of stories about it, tells how people live. They draw some parallels about like how these cities started to become abandoned. It's just a really engaging, interesting just archeology book of the history. It's a really good book. It’s different from what I usually read but, yeah, I really enjoy it. I think that Annalee Newitz is a really good writer.
I also mention a book that has been making the rounds. It's called “Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America.” Well, America as somebody who's entrenched in white male America, it's definitely an interesting read. It's just basically about privilege and white supremacy and the history of the US and like how you know, white people, white men, have kind of come in and, and bungled things. They talk about Buffalo Bill and kind of the Wild West culture and how that happened. They talk about the kind of legacy of football, American football. It's good. It's just a good recounting of things, of the history of the US and kind of like how, you know, oftentimes the perspective we get through popular culture and through history class is different.
Tim: Yeah. The history of, you know, America, basically.
Andy: The actual...
Tim: You know, it's...
Andy: Turns out, everything's racist. Everything is created and changed and reported on through the eyes of white, male America. The author, Ijeoma Oluo, also wrote “So You Want to Talk About Race,” which is a really good book. So this is, this is kind of her follow-up to that.
And I'm writing with a pencil that I know that we'll talk about, the Blackwing 223. Well, I won't get into too many details there in my Leuchtturm notebook.
Johnny: What color is your Leuchtturm?
Andy: Yeah. This is still my same one that I've been using. I'm almost finished with it. It's um, that dark blue, red dots one.
Johnny: No, I can say you could probably find whatever color it is in that pencil to match.
Andy: That's true. That is true.
Johnny:Couldn't resist.
Andy: Actually, this journal looks really good with the Lake Tahoe Blackwing. Is that the 72, 73? Just like those, those deep blues, I think, look really good together. And I don't think we've ever had like a really good scarlet red Blackwing, right?
Johnny: Except the TWA ones. Yeah, that was maybe too bright.
Andy: That's true. That's a good point. Yeah, that would also.
Johnny: When you’re saying scarlet, I'm thinking like blood red.
Andy: Yeah. Yeah, this red dots notebook has a really good, just like bright, bright red. I think that would look really good with the TWA pencil for sure. Yeah. Cool. Should we get in Fresh Points, Tim? What do you have going on?
Tim: Well, I want to start with super exciting news, just an update on Plumbago 8, which we've been working on, which is the, if you haven't heard about it, is the music issue. So we've got people submitting both written stuff and music, recorded music, and it's going really well. I've been really impressed with the stuff that I've heard so far.
We've gotten now, what, somewhere around 10 music submissions and then a bunch of written submissions. And if, when you're listening to this, it'll probably be, what, the 15th. Something like that, the 14th or 15th of April, which means you've got about two weeks left to submit. So get in touch with us if you want to do that. We've got everything. We've got a really cool spread of submissions so far. We've got people using stationary sounds to create a track of music, like a rhythmic stationary track. We've got a couple of people doing something similar to that. We've got singer-songwriter kind of stuff that's coming in that is really great from some familiar names in the group. Uh it's been a lot of fun.
Andy, how are you feeling about the written side of things?
Andy: I'm feeling great, yeah. We have a few really good memoir pieces. Somebody is writing a fictionalized account of kind of some experiences through music that they've had, which is cool. Have a comic by Diana Oakley who writes the Mad Penciler comic, which has been in every issue since issue 2 is back, which is cool. So just got that in today. Yeah. This is going to be a really good issue. I have some leads I'm trying to track down on designing a cover. I don't know how that's going to go yet, but I’m really excited about that too. So, yeah, definitely, wrapping up submissions and especially like, just something I'll mention, I would love to see submissions from from people of color and from women and from, you know, non-binary and transgender people.
I think we have one woman submitting a song. And, yeah, I would love to see, yeah, just some more musical submission diversity from our folks, but yeah, it's going to be good. You know, any way you look at it.
Tim: Yeah. So if you're out there and you're thinking about submitting something, but maybe you're on the fence. I mean, we're definitely taking like a zine approach to this so don't think that you have to have some kind of like crazy recording set-up and you know, some professional quality thing. You just get in touch with us and email us at plumbagomagazine@gmail.com. It'll come to all of us. If you're dealing in music, then you'll talk to me and I'll talk to you about recording and what we can do and what I can do on my end to help you. So we'll do our part to push you over the edge to get it written and recorded or composed and recorded or whatever it is, where we're here to help you. And we've been really excited about the stuff we've gotten so far, and we’re always open to more.
Andy: I guess one thing I want to mention is, if you are an illustrator or an artist, and you want to just provide an illustration that goes along with one of the stories or written pieces that we have, please get in touch. And also if you are interested in writing some liner notes, like a short little interview or something with a few of these musicians that are submitting, please get in touch as well. We want a little written companion to the album in the zine so we're definitely gonna love to see some volunteers there. So, yeah.
Tim: Yep. So you’ve got about two weeks from when you hear this to get some things, you know, pitched him in some, hopefully submitted. So just reach out to us as soon as you can. We'd love to hear from you.
And the other thing, and this kind of rolls into our interview with Noah later on, but I wasn't here the first time that no, it was on the show because I was doing stuff with membership podcast and missed it. And so I just recently, Noah was super kind enough to, along with some of the samples that we're going to talk about, was able to send me a Høvel, which I had never had before, which you guys have had in hand for awhile now. And it's actually going to, what I'm about to say is going to sound a little out of place when you listen to the interview, because just a little like, you know, inside baseball or whatever.
We recorded the interview with Noah, like a week and a half ago. So in the meantime, since we interviewed him, I've gotten really good at the Høvel and I love it. Like I'm just obsessed with sharpening. I just walk out onto the deck and sharpen a pencil with a Høvel, like whenever I've got like a dead few minutes and just like chk chk ch you know, freehand, I started doing it that way. And I just, yeah, I love it. I use it all the time. So I'm in love with this little sharpener and I didn't think I would actually, when I first got it. I was like, this seems a little fussy, but it's not, I mean, it's kind of, it was just like a touch thing. It was like a feel thing. Once I got the feel for it, it was super satisfying. It was better. Something like... it's like what I wish it felt like when I was knife sharpening, you know? Cause which I do like doing that as well, but it's a nice feeling. I wish it was something that I felt a little better carrying around with me, you know, but it's such, it's such like an heirloom beautiful piece of machined brass that I just leave it at home and leave it on my desk, but that's it. I just was going to say that I'm just loving the Høvel and I'm sharpening pencils left and right. Like crazy.
Andy: You're so much better at it than I am even after two years. So I just like, I don't know.
Tim: It's just, I don't know what it is. It just like clicked with me or it's just like it scratched some kind of like primal itch to use a knife to sharpen the pencil
Johnny: I challenge you to a Høvel Off for charity.
Andy: Ooh. Oh, for charity.
Johnny: I can sharpen all of the paint off of a pencil.
Tim: You focus so much on the fact that you can, you haven't asked if you should. I just butchered the Ian Malcolm quote from “Jurassic Park.” What is it?
Johnny: Looks so old and like beat up.
Tim: Mine’s already, yeah, looking pretty rough. I love it. It's good. It gets my, as a throwback to an earlier episode, but my caustic hands have already started turning the brass, like different colors, so.
Johnny: Yeah. I mean, I'm usually covered in coffee, oil...
Tim: That was episode title of like episode 8 or something, wasn’t it? That was like a really long time ago.
Andy:I don't remember that.
Tim: It was when I first got my Midori bullet pencil and it like immediately started to like turn brown as soon as I touched it. I, it was yeah, but you're on Gamber.
Johnny: Yeah, I was tempted to polish mine for the challenge, but...
Tim: Now, but the thing is, we got to decide if it's going to be like, who's going to sharpen a pencil or who's going to do some goofy crap and do like, it's like trick shooting. It's like the difference between, like, I feel like I am just some like really solid, like forward on a pro-team that like scores points quietly. And you're like the Harlem GlobeTrotters and you're like doing like needlessly fancy stuff.
Andy: Get on his level.
Johnny: If Michael Jordan was on the GlobeTrotters, that's my Høvel game.
Tim: Yeah. Okay. Well, yeah, whatever.
Johnny: I only barely understand what that statement means.
Tim: Well, it meant enough to hurt my feelings. So you're on. I'm the Michael Jordan. So yeah, loving that Høvel. And the last thing I've got is, yeah, so Blackwing has been busy.
Andy: They have.
Tim: With a couple
Johnny: The paint shop has been busy.
Tim: Yeah. The paint shop has been busy and they've got, we're gonna talk about the 223 later, but they just announced, what was this, like two days ago? Something like that, but very recently announced their partnership with the Indie Bookstore Day.
So Andy, you had sent this to me. I hadn't seen it until you sent it over. And I love the idea of it, of course, right? Like, I mean, partnering up with indie bookstores is like a perfect home run of what they should be doing and who they should be partnering up with, which, I love that. But I hate this pencil.
Johnny: Yeah. What was that sharpener called where you could like connect two different pencils together?
Andy: Oh, yeah, the—I know what you mean.
Johnny: Yeah. It was like some sort of like Tetris situation, but it looks like they did that.
Tim: It looks like an accident, kind of.
Andy: It's not a happy little accident. It's a sad little accident.
Tim: No, it's just—I don't know. I don't like to be, I don't like to dump on things, but I just, I really, when a good cause isn't enough to make me buy a Blackwing every time, when it costs $27, and it's like, I know that not that much of it is going to the cause or whatever, you know. This time I just, I'm going to pass on these. But they just look, with that kind of barf-yellow eraser that's on it, I'm just not a fan of this at all. And I was a little disappointed cause like I want to buy something that's associated with indie bookstore day, but this one . . .
Andy: And I would love to see more design rationale. Right? Like how, why does it look the way it does, like the lower fourth, the third or whatever is like kind of a Palomino orangy red, and then it's like a,
Tim: Almost like a coral or something.
Andy: Yeah. And then there's a really nice blue, like the colors in and of themselves are really great, but there's this weird, like stripe set that's slightly partway
Tim: Yeah, it’s like those tattoos that dudes get on their forearm, like
Andy: Yeah
Tim: a stripe that loops all the way around
Andy: and I, and I think that stripe would look really good on the ferrule or up higher on the pencil.
Tim: And I really don't understand the white background on the type; white text just on that blue would have been better and then move that line up. And I just wish it was a solid color too. I don't like the dual color. It's like, just because they can, you know?
Andy: Yeah. And the partnership. I'm still trying to figure out the partnership too. What it seems like is only independent bookstores are going to be selling these Blackwings, right? So somebody posted a picture of the, like the order form, but is there a certain amount of money that's going to independent bookstores, or
Tim: No, I don’t think that’s the case. So I got a feeling what basically is happening is that if the indie bookstore buys 10 dozen of these to sell in their store, that means they're going to make 30 bucks or whatever, you know,
Andy: Yeah. Yeah.
Tim: I don't know what the profit margin is on Blackwings, but yeah.
Johnny: They’ll have people calling them up. Can you ship them to me? No, we don't do that.
Tim: Yeah. I should have done that one second, because all my ecstatic Høvel talk should have been the end of my—I don't want to end on this fresh point. I've got to find something else. Let me look at my desk. Hang on.
Johnny: Why don't you take the first one on my list? Though that might be even less positive.
Tim: No, it's okay. I was just desperately—Oh, no, no. It's okay. It's okay guys. I just didn't want to end on that. I mean, it is cool. Here's one—I'll end on a positive. How about that? That's like something that like a therapist would say to do, right? It is a firm graphite, right? Which it’s
Andy: Yeah, I believe so.
Tim: it’s not common to see a custom Blackwing that's with the firm core, which, that's a cool, like, development.
Andy: That's a good point.
Tim: That's possible. And that's like out there, so that now they're gonna start doing customs with a more diverse you know, kinds of—cause they went from, it started out with all balanced, right? And then, so now this is just one more, so that's, that's a cool thing. Yeah.
That's all I got. What about you, Johnny?
Johnny: Well, the new Blackwing is out. So you've been to my place with my kid. Charlotte has a loft bed and the other ones have bunk beds. So Henry held his up to the border along the wall and it disappeared because it matches the border in a nursery.
So like I have a theory that this pencil was going to not be the ugliest Blackwing ever made, and instead was going to say something about This machine kills fascists, but everybody guessed it and they went, Hey, let's make something so outlandishly ugly
Andy: Stop the presses!
Johnny: that nobody will guess what this is. And then instead of taking the blue or yellow in it, let's give it an eraser that's the color of dirt. Like not even potting soil, like the kind of dirt you don't want to see.
Tim: If it said This machine kills fascists, I would have gone into like hoarding mode and I probably would have bought four.
Johnny: Oh, yeah. I would have bought tons of those.
Tim: Which, it's on the box or something, which like, you know, you can show your box to people?
Andy: Well, we live in a world where taking a stand against fascists is a political statement, so . . .
Tim: I don't understand why they won’t just make pencils. Why does everything have to be political? It's like,
Johnny: Yeah. I heard somewhere that someone accused Blackwing of being very social-justice-warrior type.
Tim: Because they don't like fascism.
Johnny: Yeah. Or like, Oh, women's right to vote. Man, that's a liberal issue.
Tim: Yeah. Wow. How dare you? Yeah.
So yeah, Henry, my Henry, has gotten in on this with me, but we've been referring to this edition as the Hot Wheels Playmat edition.
Johnny: That's the perfect description.
Tim: I will say I did fix, I sent you guys that picture, right, where I fixed mine?
Johnny: I couldn't see what you fixed.
Andy: Yeah.
Tim: I used a black Sharpie and blacked out all the white lines in the middle of the road,
Andy: Oh, that's right.
Tim: which really makes it look like a little, you know, halfway decent. There's something about those lines that makes it, it just like pushes it over the edge into kind of hokey. I'm still not using them, but
Johnny: Yeah, my kids didn't want any of these. I was like, Hey, you guys want one of these? They're like, no, they turned their noses up.
Andy: I like the
Tim: Rosie just takes it and cracks it in half and drops it on the floor. Like
Andy: I like the design in, like, the art, right? Like spread of a canvas, you know, it's a very sort of like, you know, expressionist kind of like road, right? With, you know, kind of green hills and shimmering byway or whatever the heck.
Johnny: It would be an amazing sleeve tattoo for somebody with a lot of guts and pain tolerance and a lot of money.
Tim: Yeah.
Andy: So, wrapped like that, kind of around an arm would look really good, but wrapped the long way around a pencil, it just doesn't do it.
Tim: I do like when they have a design where the dozen pencils, like all of them look different. I do like that. Like where the printing lands on different colors. Like that was pretty cool to see those lined up at the top, but
Johnny: I don’t think that’s on purpose.
Tim: I don't care. I still, I like it. But think of how cool it would have been if they would've done, even like, stick with the open road kind of thing. If they would've done a pencil that was similar to the Volume 4, that had some kind of like textured, matte finish that was like a road, you know? And just doing like solid yellow lines down one side of it, you know what I'm saying? Like, so it was like a black matte with the dotted, like, road lines in the middle. And then Blackwing on the other side. Like, it would've been pretty cool.
Johnny: Yeah. When ours came, I declared them the ugliest Blackwings ever made, and somebody said, What about the jade ones? And I said, Did you hear me?
Tim: You're like, Oh yeah,
Johnny: I will take the jade ones four times for a year over this thing.
Tim: Yeah. Man.
Andy: Yeah. I really liked that composition book that they, I haven't seen it in person, but the comp book that they put out to go with it.
Tim: That's the other thing that like, kind of pissed me off. Cause I was like, why wasn't that the extra? Give us the notebook. Like, this can't cost that much. Like, I mean, postcards, great. But I mean, I don't know. I just, I might've been a little kinder if it was like, they would've thrown in one of those notebooks or something with, for subscribers. Even though I'm a subscriber and I got mine like a week after they announced it on Instagram. So it was like
Andy: Yeah.
Tim: spoiled and then got mine 10 days later.
Johnny: I got mine Saturday. I just got mine. No, I got em Friday, I’m a liar. I think that I'm on their crap list because mine always seem to come late, lately.
Andy: Well, here you are. I wonder why.
Johnny: Yeah. Ever since I said that the Eras were the worst-put-together pencil that was more than 50 cents. I didn't say that.
Andy: The thing about that composition book is a bunch of people got theirs and it was sort of like banged and wrinkled. And I was looking at the product shot on their website. And if you look at their product picture of this notebook, and you look at the bottom, there's like a little wrinkle squish down there. So it seems like, it looks like there may be just, just kind of, I don't know. Just a little fragile.
Johnny: Oh, I see it. I mean the font and the colors on that, pretty awesome.
Andy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like that one a lot.
Johnny: I actually assumed it would be more expensive than that. Hmm. Hmm! Yeah, but then I'll have to use one of those pencils. No. And this is as negative as we get.
Tim: Yeah, sorry guys. Sorry everybody.
Johnny: No, it’s not your fault.
Tim: No, I was just apologizing to the listeners. Sorry, ladies and gentlemen. We are...
Johnny: We’re getting really superlative. Ugliest, silliest.
Tim: Yes.
Johnny: No, I mean, every… you know...
Tim: Yeah. Nursery-themed, yeah.
Johnny: Yeah. All series have to have an “ugliest.” It's how it works.
Andy: Yeah, that's true.
Tim: It's like the it was like Buddhist monks with their like sand art, right? You gotta make like one imperfection somewhere in the middle. I hope the next one's just like super simple because that's where they shine, I think are the ones that are really straightforward.
Andy: Yeah.
Johnny: So, Folks should have gotten their issues or their copies of Disposable number 2 by now. I only got one back so far. Last time I think I sent them out in mid-December, right as the big mail explosion was hitting, and I had no idea it was coming and I was still getting ones that were returned in like late February. So hopefully it's just the one. And I know who that is. Okay. Taken care of, but if you didn't get them, then drop us a note and I'll get one out to you.
Andy: And remind people who you, like, how you qualify for one of these.
Johnny: Ooh, I’m sorry, yeah, if you back us on Patreon at $5 a month or more, you get Disposable four times a year. And we should call it Recyclable because you don't want it, you know,
Andy: Maybe we should.
Johnny: Yeah. And speaking of zines, that's all I have to talk about. So, I put out all 12 issues of Pencil Revolution in one volume that is cheaper and way easier for me to mail. So if you don't have them, save yourself some money and go buy that thing. And, by the time this comes out, my April issue will be out, which is called Reduce, Reuse, Revolution. And it's about eco pencils and also how none of them are actually eco pencils. Yeah. That's my short zine plug. And that's it.
Andy: Well, speaking of zines, I'll briefly talk about 404 magazine. I, yeah, so I sent out, I think, I talked already about issue 2 that has been going out. I really love the color of it. It's really glossy, which is something I wasn't anticipating when I ordered it. So this month is national poetry month. If you remember last national poetry month, we had the amazing poet Kiki Petrosino on talking about poetry, just kind of in, just in general and, you know, writing poetry and having a zine where I take, like, interface writing, and I sort of turn it into poetry. I was trying to think of something cool to do for national poetry month. And I think that means for issue 3, we would love to see your original poetry that is inspired by error messages and new product tours and just like words that you find in digital interfaces and websites. So I already have a few really good submissions. I have a poem by a friend of mine about wrestling with a chat bot to try to get them to put her in touch with a human. That's really good.
Johnny: Sounds biblical.
Andy: Yeah, it does. And very existential, right? Like, am I talking to a human being or am I talking to a robot? Like sometimes you can't tell. Have a few other really good ones. I'm going to be working on some myself. So whether or not it's like, you know, in free verse poetry or a style that, you know, you choose, or if you're trying to do a limerick or a sonnet or whatever, I would love to hear from you.
Johnny: *Gasp*
Andy: Johnny, you gasped.
Johnny: Oh, I was thinking “limerick” and you said it.
Andy: Ooh, yeah, do it.
Johnny: What is your policy on...
Tim: Profanity.
Johnny: ...blue language.
Tim: I was gonna say, let me finish this for him. It's going to say...
Johnny: Can I use the F word?
Andy: It depends on the context. I might be willing to go for it.
Johnny: I can always invent the context for that.
Andy: Yeah. Yeah. Let's talk.
Johnny: Excellent.
Andy: Blue language. So, yeah, 404 magazine issue 3 will be really good if you go to 404.computer, you can read more about that. Wanted to give a couple of quick updates. One is, if you're a Patreon subscriber at $10 a month or more, and you have signed up before April 1st, you are getting a t-shirt. Really, you should have gotten a t-shirt. I sent a bunch of them out and except maybe for some people overseas they should have arrived by now. If that is not the case, please get in touch with me.
And, finally, something we are trying to do more of is start doing transcripts of episodes. So, I think I've talked about this before. I don't know if I've done it here, but there's a new editing app that I'm using called Descript, which lets you edit audio sort of like you're editing like a word processing document. It kind of auto-generates a transcript for you and it's not super accurate, but it gives you a baseline transcript to work with. And we have a really, really wonderful group of volunteers, dedicated Erasable volunteers, who are taking 10 minute chunks of this transcript and copy-editing it. So, we did this for episode 160, I'm sorry, 159 and 160 and if you go to the episode page on erasable.us, you can read the transcript. So if we have people who are hard of hearing or deaf or just plain don't want to listen to us blather on, they can read us blathering on. Yeah. So, if...
Tim: We're better on paper is what you're saying.
Andy: It's true. It's true. If this is something that you are interested in helping with, we would love your help. So get in touch and we can figure out if this workflow is working. It's kind of still an experiment. We are not to the point where we can release transcripts at the same time as we're releasing episodes. We’re maybe like a week or so behind. But it's, yeah, it's a good start. Yeah. All right, guys, should we get into the main topic?
Johnny: Yeah.
Andy: Get no, get Noah on the horn.
All right. And for our main topic today, we are joined by a familiar voice. You may remember Noah Bier from Makers Cabinet, who came on the show in 2019 on episode 111 to talk about the Høvel, which is that very solid brass, plain pencil sharpener that we've talked about a few times since then. So we're going to chat about a really cool new pencil-related project launch with him. And also some of the things that they've launched since then, which is you know, we have in our hands. So, Noah, welcome.
Noah: Hi, nice to meet you guys. It's not...
Andy: Yeah. Yeah, it's been wow. It was only in 2019, but it feels like a lifetime ago.
Noah: Yeah, a lot has changed since then.
Andy: So, Noah, for people who may not have heard that episode, would you tell us a little bit about yourself and Makers Cabinet?
Noah: So, my name is Noah from London. I am one of the directors of Makers Cabinet. What Makers create, beautiful drawing and writing tools that last a lifetime or more. Currently we make products, including the Høvel pencil sharpener, the Iris drawing compass and the Stria folding ruler. And what we try and do is to create products, which inspire creativity, are a joy to use, and you keep them for a lifetime so they continue on your creative journey for the whole of your life. And they're made durable and to just...
Andy: And they are very solid brass so you can also bludgeon somebody with it if you need to.
Noah: That's a secondary feature.
Andy: Put that on your the website.
Johnny: Can you legally carry the Stria in the UK?
Noah: Yeah, I think so. We did play like a bit like a butterfly knife cause you can flick it open. And I haven't had to ever use it or get anywhere near someone that would test me and make me pull it out.
Andy: We're Americans so we just want to turn everything into a weapon. So no, these are...
Johnny: Yeah. It's interesting to hear, when we talk on the Erasable group about. you know, carrying a pocket knife to sharpen your pencils, and folks in some other countries are like, we can't do that.
Andy: I think three inches is the...isn’t that the maximum size, at least in the UK?
Noah: Yeah, I think you can do that. And I think that if you are someone like me, who will carry quite a wide selection of pencils that a police officer has never seen before, and you can tell them all of the characteristics, they will probably believe you that you're a pencil nerd rather than, I don't know, an aggressive individual.
Johnny: That’s a good point. So, it doesn't just feel like a long time since you were on Erasable? It's been a while in so far as the products you guys are putting out. So since then you've put out two of your three products. Can you talk to us about the Stria ruler, which is the, you know, brass ruler that folds in half that I can't put down and that my son won't put down and it's going to fall on his foot eventually.
Andy: It has the most satisfying little clicky sound inside of it. Yeah. When you, yeah.
Johnny: It’s my new fidget toy.
Noah: So with Stria, we launched it on Kickstarter and designed it after the second product, the Iris drawing compass. And we thought of doing a folding ruler because, from our previous campaigns, we've sort of built up a little bit of a community of followers and people that were starting to send us ideas for things that they'd like us to have a go at designing. One of the things that popped up quite a lot was a folding ruler. And we were reminded of the plastic folding rulers we were given or we used in school. Often minutes until they snapped. I do remember trying to play like, what's it called, Smoke, when you like put it against your desk and you strum it, but I'm sure that wasn't great for its structural integrity. So we thought we'd make one that was really durable and satisfying. We thought about different methods for it to fold up and on a rotation. And from our experience doing woodworking, which is also where we found our inspiration for the Hovel pencil sharpener, we used a sort of dovetail joint for the form of a hinge. So one of the arms, where it takes around the other one, and there's like a dovetail hinge. So we've also put inside of it, as the guys have already mentioned some like little grub screws, which click into place at 45 degree angles, so that makes a really satisfying sound so that you can easily (Tim: so good) , but it also makes a bit of a nice fidget toy. So not like this, but in some zoom meetings, you will hear me clicking.
[00:40:15] Andy: click, click, click, click, click.
[00:40:17] Noah: click, open, close. But yeah, it's to having a desk around you whilst you draw.
[00:40:22] Andy: And Johnny had, I don't know if you got this, but yeah, we can hear that. That's amazing. Did you, did you understand, did you. Understand right off as I did not. What that little screw is
[00:40:32]That came with it? No, I mean, that was, I had to ask Noah before you got in the call. So there's, there's a little brass .... neural screw that comes with it that you use to sort of like tighten the, the hinge on the Stria.... that I just like, it, it, I, I had no idea what it was for, but that, yeah, it makes a lot of sense.
[00:40:51] And then Noah, what did you say about what you can do? What else you can do with this
[00:40:54] Noah: so you use the little stump screw to adjust the hinge so you can make the resistance of the arms tighter or looser. And then we were having.... these little hex in the office and we kept losing them because they're so small. So we thought, why don't we put it somewhere where we will never lose it?
[00:41:10] So you can basically, stow the little thumb screw in your Høvel. So know that you've also got your thumb screw for adjusting your Stria.
[00:41:20] Andy: That's really clever. I, I have been getting ads for... just like crazy on Instagram.... for the next thing, which is the Iris. I understand the action of that, Iris, but only in the context of , cameras, right?
[00:41:38] I'm not really a much of a drawer, but the idea of using an Iris to draw circles is just such an interesting idea to me. Can you talk a little bit about where the idea came from for that? And how this came into the world?
[00:41:52] Yeah.
[00:41:52] Noah: So, Funny when we were first starting out, my two business partners, Ben and Odin, had met for the first and Ben went round to Odin's for the first time to see his student dorms. And he walked into Odins bedroom and the room was filled with drawings of circles.
[00:42:11] And what Odin had done was - he was trying to master the technique of drawing a circle perfectly with no aids. (background laughter) And, and I can imagine this and I, and I've seen Odin's drawings and I can really imagine that they probably weren't that close to a perfect circle. So we knew that there was something there and that like, The traditional drawing compass where you have the hole in the center of your page was not something that
[00:42:36] we enjoyed using and that what we would usually use was little cups, paint, and just anything that was round and around our desks as well. So what we wanted to do was create something that would give you that same stencil, but was scalable. And then we went around with cameras one day and it struck us that the aperture was a really great, great way of creating a scalable stencil.
So you would just set it to the diameter of your choice and then take your writing instrument, preferably a pencil, and use it to draw a circle.
Andy: do you want to know what my favorite little hidden feature of this, this thing is that I just, I just realized this morning when I was playing with it is... on the back of the Iris the, the words Iris, and then the makers cabinet logo are laser etched on it. But only when it comes to an almost closed do they show up?
So it's it, it's just, it's a little like movie animation, right? Like you're... you're closing the IRS and then all of a sudden the words just sort of like come together.
Noah: Yeah. It's like your own little
stop motion before your very eyes.
Andy: yeah. So what are some you?
Noah: 10 millimeter Mark. So, if you ever want to find it easily, you can just easily scale down to that and
Andy: Just do that.
Noah: check out the back of it.
Andy: What are some use cases for this Iris? Is it based off a design, like the, you know, the Høvel is based off of a wood planer or is this like kind of an original design.
Noah: It's it's an original design from what we know, it's the first use of a aperture for drawing a circle. Most apertures aren't round as you'll notice from cameras. So what we had to do was make sure that the circles were as close to being round as possible with it, drawing circles.
You can also use it to measure circles. Measure a pipe and put something around, it’s great for that too. So yeah, it's good for drawing circles, but also measuring round things too.
Johnny: Oh, that's really cool. So. You know, that thing has a lot of moving parts. And I can't imagine how complicated this was to design, but with the Høvel, you used to post on Instagram, a lot of your like prototypes and there were 3d printed and such. And the Hovel was so precise in the way that, where you grip it and the angle of the blade.
So I'm wondering which one was harder to, to design and sort of manufacturer.
Noah: it was definitely the Iris. I think that with the Hovel, we found it very difficult because it was the first thing that we had taken from idea to production. And that taught us a lot. But then the Iris, because there are many more moving parts in it. There's a bit more, there's a few more... like processing involved with it.
It's not just one material like a Høvel, and there's also the stainless steel. That's made it a lot harder and people often ask us like, whether it's taken a lot of maths to design it. And I think that if we had initially started it with the most precise maths than it would have been a lot easier.
But I remember with one of our first prototypes, we wanted to add the scale, which helps you to, --- and the way that we had done that was that we had opened the Iris, closing it by a millimeter at a time and marking down -- was to create the think that, yeah, -- it was pretty difficult to produce, but now after we've produced and we've made the second version, which is what you guys have -- It's become a lot (audio distortion). And you may have also noticed that there have been some fakes produced on Amazon.
Andy: Yes. Yes. I have noticed those.
Noah: Yeah. So when we just finished our Kickstarter campaign ads. Where they had used our videos, which was actually my hands using the Iris and Ben, my business partner filming me using it. And they'd used these ads to sell a fake version, which is vastly inferior in quality, -- often breaks.
And also it's just a piece of rubbish compared to what we've done. It does. Yeah. Yeah.
Andy: I, I remember I had a conversation with the Baron Fig guys and they have people who like, you know, would replicate the Confidant notebook, like well, after they yeah. And it's amazing how quickly those can pop up. Right? Like people are, I mean, even though it is a vastly inferior product and it breaks like.
You have to admire how fast they can sort of make that happen.
Noah: (laughs) I know it's, it's something to admire. I think.
Johnny: copies of the, The Parker 51 copies for the new one actually came out before the Parker 51 did. (background laughs)
Andy: The Parklette 51. Yeah. So what what's, what is the difference between the first and the second Iris?
Noah: With the first Iris, it didn't have a texture on the top. And there's a couple of reasons why we hadn't added the texture. Firstly it (audio distortion) out. And we didn’t have enough people. So. When we ended up mass producing it, it also had a different sort of finish to the one that we had done ourselves.
So we found that people weren't getting enough grip on it. And we actually had a really ... where Adam Savage from MythBusters had bought one of our irises and was sharing it on his channel. And ... we would have a look at that. And we thought if, if Adam Savage our like God or our, like, role model, is telling us to make a design change, then we've got to listen to him and make that change for all users.
So the new version has this extra texture, which makes it much more easy to grip. And then we've also added a little bit of grease and changed the tolerances. So just so it moves, extra smoothly and satisfying.
Andy: yeah.
Nice.
Tim: So, aside from the brand what's changed if anything, about the Høvel, since we last spoke, I guess, I mean, I unfortunately missed that episode, but since I listened to that episode in January of 2019, when you, when you joined.
Noah: So not much has changed with the Høvel itself. We've kind of worked on the accessories with it, but not much has changed with that. However, there has been a lot with the brand that's changed. So. We changed our name. So we're now Makers Cabinet, as you guys introduced before, and that made much more sense to us than our previous name and was also a lot easier for us to spell when we were on the phone to people too. (background laughs)
So that was we've finished university, which was something that happened last summer. So a lot of you don't know, but whilst we were, (Andy: ‘congratulations’) thank you very much. Shout out to the class of 2020, that was quite nice. So we've also just moved into a new office space.
So anyone listening is invited to come pop by for a coffee at some point, if you're ever in East London. So that means we can do (audio distortion) They're developing the products. And it's just nice working out of our like student dorms. Hires too.
So we brought some more people into the team. So I don't know where this is. Okay. But I thought I'd just shout out. Will, Alex, Sharita and Trisha are new stars who are already like giving us some expertise that we didn't have before.
Andy: Welcome to the team, everybody. That's awesome. I was going to be in London in June of last year for a conference, which of course didn't happen. So, someday I will again be in London and have coffee with you in East London. So. Going back to the Hovel a little bit. Do you, so this is something that we noticed and actually what we named our episode last time after... it would like it, it gave us a point that kind of looks like the Eiffel tower.
Do you get so many photos of people showing off their extreme pencils?
Noah: Yeah, a hundred percent, so many. I think we're even bit inspired by that, that we've started to make these little postcards with our friends Sabree. While we show. a whole array of different points that you can achieve. So you can make the Darth Maul where it's sharp on both ends or that the Mohawk with the flat like shortens and, and, and led the Impaler, which is like the really vicious,
Andy: No. Can we use that postcard as our episode title cover
Noah: of course. Yeah. Yeah. I will I can send it over to you. I was also, I was also thinking, I don't know how, but maybe we could give you the design font. I don't know if people want to print it off or something to maybe,
Andy: Yeah.
Noah: post the postcard to everyone in the group, but if they could print it off, that'd be nice.
Andy: That would be amazing. Yeah. You could sell prints, make a poster of just like really weird. I don't know if you saw our last episode, cover art episode one 59, but Johnny had a very strange, disturbing point on that pencil
Johnny: Oh, yeah,
Andy: that wasn't from a hole. That was it.
Noah: because I use Apple podcasts, it doesn't necessarily change the arts each week. So I'm sorry that I'm not listening on your website or the Patrion. Sorry on that.
Andy: you don't want, you don't want to see this particular point. I don't think you made that with Johnny.
Yeah,
Johnny: but usually when I do it with a Høvel, I'll leave like two inches of wood so that I'm holding wood the whole time. And it feels really nice.
Andy: yeah,
Johnny: So I'm speeding of extended pencil things. You have an upcoming release that is a pencil extender slash holder. Can you talk about that a little bit and tell us why it's different from the limited number that are
Noah: Yes, totally. So depending on when this podcast is going out, it might be live on Kickstarter. And what it is called Pharell. And what it is, is a pencil extender, which will take your tiny nups and put them into this like beautifully crafted holder and extend them. the reason why we had come up with this was because I had noticed a lot of people comparing their naps and then knob jars in the group.
And I thought that that was really something missing because all of the pencil extenders were kind of antiques and as lovely as they are, I thought we needed a new one. So is what we did was we Take We put them into this beautiful call it mechanism which has sort of find in milling machines.
And then it basically hugs the pencil tightly, length and get all that graphite out.
Andy: Hmm. That's a great idea. And yeah, and it has, it has a great title too. It's just the feral, just very simple.
Noah: Yeah, it is. We wanted to just like shine the light on that little bit, that often gets overlooked on the pencil and about the Pharaoh. So the Pharaoh is the thing that you keep. And it's the because it breasts so nicely in your hand. And it's doing all But the graphite is just sitting there nicely inside working away.
Tim: So how, how big of a pencil no fits
Noah: So, we're going to have our own that come with it. They're a little bit pencil, but you can sort of take any used a quarter of it or so and then you can so yeah, between seven and eight millimeters inside of it.
Tim: Gotcha. And what w how, how heavy is it? I'm curious, just imagining
Andy: Okay. Compared to your stria. It's you know, you, you can also bludgeoned somebody with it. I assume.
Noah: We've actually tried really hard to make it not as light as possible, but to make it as balanced. So it should be about 45 grams. So it won't be so heavy in your hand. And also you've got the words in the pencil, which is sort of balancing it on your page too. So you'll your hand and it will be more heavy than a normal pencil, but some people like that, it means that they can be a bit more cursive or, with their handwriting or winter or into.
Andy: Yeah.
Tim: Yeah. And so like you'd mentioned like once a pencil gets to a certain length, but does it, I mean, does, does it have like an aperture or whatever that opens up enough to fit like slightly larger diameter pencils or mainly just like any traditional sized
Noah: Yeah, so it has, so the colleagues will open up between seven and eight millimeters. So most pencils are within that range. It won't It won't fit one of my favorite pencils, which is the, I think it's called the, like the Viking micro or micro, which is like this tiny, tiny it's even just like half the size of a golf pencil.
Pencils that are within that. Well, all pencils in that size, that hacks round, triangular, whatever, colored pencils, if you can get a makeup pencil, that is that size that will go in there too.
Andy: So, I know that back in 2018, you had some really interesting photos of brass pencil holders and Instagram. So it seems like maybe you've been thinking about maybe the basics of this for awhile. What and correct me if I'm wrong there, but what made 20, 21 the right time to roll this out?
Noah: Yeah, you're right. I can't believe you spotted that. But yeah, were playing with that just around the same time as the Iris, we thought it could be a really cool thing to go with the Iris. It might make drawing the circle easier. And then we sort of found that it, it does a little bit, but not really enough.
And then we sort of thinking, started thinking about how we would hold the pencil in place. And which we've used with the columns, it does. It is something that is quite technical and precise. So we put it on the back burner until we sort of had the capabilities and knowledge to do it.
And we're now at that point, since we've, we can devote all our time to it. We've got the team available to help us with it. So the best time to do it because it would also with the other products too.
Johnny: So on your website, you have pictures of black wings and you guys sell black wings. So I have to ask, because this is erasable. What are some of your favorite pencils and pencil accessories that aren't made by
Noah: Yeah. So we are, we are big fans of black wings and I've got to say I think time pencils was one that they came out with, never walk alone pencil. It just meant a lot to me never really seen a pencil or felt that much for the pencil. So that was one that I really like.
And I think that. I'm not likely to ever use or use them. They'll just be my desk as a reminder. But anyway, I do have some other pencils, which I do really like, and I have a thing for the naturals. So as in the black queen naturals, but also just other natural lacquers. So the Viking Rolo is one of my favorites.
And there's also, I don't name, but there's like a Tombow that's a recycled Tombo with this like really crazy finger joint.
Andy: Oh yeah. Yeah. I love that one. Is that the, the 95 50? No, that's not that one. I know which one you're talking about. It's great.
Noah: Yeah, it's so cool. It's I just like stare at it and twist it in my hand. And I can't think of how they've managed to do that.
Andy: have you, have you ever used a Tennessee red, the
Noah: I have, yeah, that was also another one that I love because the smell is just amazing. I wish I could bottle it and wear it. Them that I ordered from, from Musgrave. It's often quite expensive to buy things in the UK, from the States. So when I do order things like them, I have to buy a load of things all at once.
So yeah, I got that whole box, which sits proudly on my desk. And then there's some other little things that I'd love to try. And I've seen the, the Karen dash shopping machine and there's like this new Eve's client blue one, which I think looks really nice and. I'd love to try it out because it's like potential capacity to the huddle, but I don't think it's quite the same.
And then little accessories this notebook brand are like a month of base brand called Mark and fold, and it's just really, really high quality notebooks. And the person that her name is Amy sure she's like done a whole like master's degree in paper and like did a whole thesis looking into like what paper is best for certain people.
So like, you can tell with them that like they've really, really crafted the products and that like the notebook is just so satisfying to use.
Andy: no, it was that Mark unfold. The name of that company,
Noah: Okay. Yeah, Mark and fold. So it's like Mark, M R K and then a plus symbol and then F O L D.
Andy: I don't think I've have you guys heard of that, Tim? Yeah.
Johnny: I don't think
Andy: Yeah, I would love to, yes, I will. I will go look for it. That would be, that sounds fun. I really, I think that there's a lot of, I hate using this word because it's such a corporate buzz word, but I think that there are a lot of interesting sort of like synergies between maker's cabinet and Baron fig.
I would love to see some sort of a collaboration with them.
Noah: Mm. Yeah, I, I, I think I should try and reach out to them
at some point.
Andy: Yeah, I think, I think what you, what you, your two companies make are very complimentary to each other. Like they don't really make highly mechanical things. Like, you know, like the, the IRS or the Høvel. And you don't make sort of like the consumables like they do. So I think that there's some really interesting overlap.
Yeah.
Noah: Well, I will, I'll have to think about that. Do you know the guys that, do you know the guys from them? Cause I know that they
Andy: I do.
Noah: did they make it? They made like a special, a reasonables. Pencil
Andy: Oh, the square. Yeah.
Noah: that's it.
Andy: Yep. Yeah. Yeah. We've had, we've had, it's actually been a little bit since we've had him on the show, but like yeah. We've, we've had them on quite a bit before and yeah, we kind of got to know them. Around the time that the confidant was released, which is their big sort of signature notebooks.
So yeah. Yeah. That'd be a fun collab. That's we're just assembling our dream team. Our fantasy stationary team here,
Tim: huddle, we're wondering, is there any plan for a, another type of sharpener, like maybe a more conventional style sharpener in the future?
Noah: I'm sorry to disappoint, but not really. I think that we've put a lot into the Hovel and we honestly think that nothing's going to beat it in terms of sharpening. I think that we are like the best at using it in the world - us three. So we're probably biased, but I don't, we're really not into conventional sharpeners - we're really over the rotation. I'm much more into the plane.
Tim: Yeah, yeah, I just - thank you so much - you sent me one and I got it yesterday? Luckily, I think it was maybe two days ago, but I've been playing with it pretty much constantly since then. And it is, it's super fun. Like when you hit that - kind of like hit your stride with it, and suddenly it all kind of clicks in and you're like “Oh, now I understand”.
Like, I don't understand the feel, or kind of like the, how much touch and feel it has to it, as opposed to just kind of like the brute force of other kinds of sharpening. And so I really enjoy doing it and I'm still trying to master using it on like a, you know, like a Blackwing, the Matte kind, but,
Noah: Have you tried it with the base?
Tim: Yes. Yeah. That's mostly what I've done. I haven't actually tried the free hand style yet, so, but I'm still learning and still enjoying myself. So
Noah: Good to hear
Tim: Yeah,
Andy: I think the world is ready for one of those sharpeners from like the 1930s, where you put the pencil in and you, you like turn a crank and there's like, it turns the pencil a little bit and there's a little like, blade that comes down and chops off a little bit and then it turns the pencil a little bit again and comes down. Maybe you can think about bringing one of those back because those are, those are a lot of fun.
Noah: Yeah. I've seen these. I don't know if you've seen them this, going viral, which was of a double-edged razor plate that would like, get turned on a stone and sharpened and then flipped over.
Andy: Yeah. I've seen
Noah: So I think that, I think that we should have to think about a blade sharpener so that we can like have a blade that you keep forever, and we just sharpen it when it's dull, but we don't have plans for that yet, but -
Andy: Yeah,
Noah: We can always have a think about that.
Andy: We'll have you on again in 2023 and, you know, talk about it.
So, so speaking about the future, I guess the last question we have here for you - you know, something you talk about a lot, especially in regards to these things you sell is, you know, it's the idea of a future - a future antique and something that will last a generation or more. And it's, it's interesting that we're - it's a cool idea to think about that we're using a tool for a certain amount of time and that we can pass it along to somebody else. I know that Johnny's talked a lot about how his kids like, have already decided what they want when he's dead. I don't have kids, so I assume it'll just be an estate sale. What is it? What is it like to think about people who will be using your products, a generation or two from now?
Even if, hopefully not, but even if your company is no longer around, like what are some design considerations for that?
Noah: Well I think that we try and design things so that they are somewhat future proof. Like there's not much you can really do to your Høvel to destroy it. And if there was something that you could do, we try and help you fix it or replace it rather than it just being completely defunct.
But I think the idea of having something that lasts so long as it's just a really nice pleasing thing, when so much of our lives is just sort of throw away or consumed - consumable sorry. And I'm really hoping that one day I'm going to be visiting like one the malls that I've visited when I went to the States a couple of years ago. Hopefully not one of your like estate sales in the future, but I really hope that one day I do come across one of my designs or like one of the team's designs and the life that it's had and creative tools.
How they may have been imbued with the user's creative spirit. It may have been with them at their lowest, in their highest moments. And then there's also I really love the idea of that - You hear these stories from the second world war soldiers whose lives were saved with their like trustee Zippo in their top pocket. And I would love to think that one of our products was doing the same to someone, hopefully not involving any guns or bullets, but just that one of these things is there as like a lifesaver and for someone's life it was one of those items.
Tim: Oh man, your kids or your grandkids sharpening your pencil on a Høvel that has a bullet dent in it. And like, that would be pretty. I love the idea of just running across something that you made in kind of an antique mall, something that's treasured.
Andy: Noah, before we go, is there anything that we did not cover that you want to talk about?
Noah: I don't know, if you like what I said and you're interested to hear about or see the Ferrule, you should just check out our Kickstarter campaign. But yeah it's really great to speak to you guys again and well, I love the community and stay well, everyone.
Andy: Yeah, our pleasure. And thank you for getting one of our t-shirts. I hear that you've got the t-shirt in a really lovely kind of like pale pink.
Noah: Yeah, I did. It is going through the USPS system. So I’n holding out
Tim: Good luck with that
Noah: I hope it's here in 2021, but
Andy: Yeah
Noah: It's totally fine. I know, I know that all too well, but yeah, I just checked it just before I joined the call today and it's just coming through New York, so it would have traveled a lot more than me this past year, so I -
Andy: Lot more than us all
Noah: I can’t wait for it to arrive
Andy: Well, Noah, where can people find you and then Makers Cabinet on the internet?
Noah: So you can find Makers Cabinet on Instagram - so just @MakersCabinet, you can find our website www.makerscabinet.com. In the group and the Erasables group you can find me Noah, yeah, just I'd love to chat.
Andy: Perfect. Well, thank you again for your time and yeah, we can't wait to see these Ferrules.
So Johnny, where can people find you on the internet?
Johnny: You could find me at pencilrevolution.com and on social media @Pencilution.
Andy: Great, Tim, how about you?
Tim: You can find me on Twitter @TimWasem and I'm on Instagram @TimothyWasem
Andy: Nice. And I am at andy.wtf and Twitter and Instagram @AWelfle.
This is The Erasable Podcast, you can find out more about us at our website at erasable.us. This episode is episode 161, and you can find a transcript and show notes and the recording at erasable.us/161. You can find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram as @ErasablePodcast.
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