Pebble Stationery Co. are based in my home town and they’ve slowly and steadily expanding their products. Pebble Stationery make notebooks and leather notebook covers. This Undated Planner is one of their latest additions and it is an alternative to the Traveler’s Company 019 – Free Weekly Planner with Memo. I’ve reviewed Pebble Stationery Co. products in the past with their Pocket Tomoe River Notebook and A5 Cahier Tomoe River Notebook.
Thanks so Lois from Pebble Stationery Co. for sending this in for review.
Pebble Stationery Co.’s Traveler’s Regular Sized Undated Planner aims to solve a common issue that many other planner systems have. It’s a problem I’m continuously struggling with. I’ve used A5 Hobonichis, I’ve used Regular and Passport sized Traveler’s Notebooks in the past, I’ve used a Hobonichi Weeks for a while, a Midori MD Notebook Diary, and most recently I’ve used the A6 Hobonich and some desktop initiatives. I’ve always struggled with consistency and that means I’m always missed days. Missed days have both the immediate affect of wasting paper and pages but also has a compound affect of uninspiring me to continue to write.
While this certainly isn’t the first undated planner around, it’s in a good common and established size and it offers more features than some. I found the Midori MD Notebook Diary a little too bare bones for my personal use and it having a predated monthly section didn’t work for me either. Everyone has different uses, issues and peculiarities regarding planner use. No one planner fits all so the more variety on offer the more that one planner will fit your use.
The planner comes wrapped in a plastic sleeve and under that there is a paper wrap that gives us the details of the book. The planner is, of course, 52gsm Tomoe River paper and is the Regular non-Passport sized Traveler’s Notebook size (called “TN Regular”) and is predominantly dot-grid which his measured at 3.6mm (this info comes from inside back of the planner). The dimensions of the notebook is 110 x 210mm and there are 140 pages. These 140 pages are enough to give you a full year but of course that can be stretched out if you miss a week or more!
The cover of the planner is a vegan Navy “leatherette”. The planner is also available in red, Light Blue, and Grey . It’s nicely textured and mimics leather to an extent. It seems to be firm enough and resistant enough to protect the journal its own. This is actually one of the intended benefits of the cover is that, while the book is the right shape and design to fit a Traveler’s Company system, it doesn’t have to be used within one and should be good enough on its own. On the front of the planner on the bottom right is the only adornment to the outside where “PEBBLESTATIONERY CO.” is etched.
The notebook also comes with two built in fabric page marker ribbons, one blue and one red (the light blue and grey both have a light blue and grey ribbon). The same colour ribbons are also present in the red version of the planner. Having two ribbons is a thoughtful addition given the different sections of the planner. If you need a third, then the built in string on the Traveler’s Notebook system could also be used.
The binding and gluing of the book seems tight and solid. It provides flexibility without being too loose.
The endpaper of the planner is not Tomoe River paper; it is a stronger paper with a higher GSM and as the endpaper serves some structural purpose this is fair enough. On this end paper it has an area for Name, Date, and Contact details.
The first four pages of (after a blank page) has yearly index pages where each day of a month is. Personally I’ve used this type of section as a habit tracker. Given that this isn’t arranged in a grid, that would be slightly more difficult compared to the index I’ve used in a Hobonichi. There is an index page for 12 months over the 4 pages with, obviously, three months per page. This section of the planner is the only area (apart from the first and last pages of Tomoe River and the endpapers) that is not a dot-grid.
After the index page there is 24 pages to represent a standard monthly layout with a square per day and a dot-grid throughout. You write the month in the top left of each of these and there is space to the right and below of the large monthly grid where extra information can be kept. This is a Monday start of the week which is what Australia uses and is the ISO standard.
Beyond that is the main section the planner. Here each of the pages roughly at least 104 pages represents a week and again uses the ISO standard Monday start. This is the same type of set up as a Hobonichi Weeks or the Traveler’s 019 – Free Weekly Planner. On the left page of the open book there is 7 day-sections with a non-dot grid spot to write day number of the month and at the top left there is a spot to write the month. The sections are encased in full straight lines. Below the boxes of days the dot grid extends a bit. On the right page there is simply a blank sheet of dot grid. At the end of a year’s worth of weekly sections there is 7 otherwise blank dot-grid pages before the end paper which simply has the Pebble Stationery Co. name and the details of the paper.
The main comparison for this notebook would be with Traveler’s Company’s own 019 – Free Weekly Planner.
The endpaper section of the 019 has a square rather that lines and designated sections and is more stylised.
The index section of the 019 fills the entire page rather than leaving some blank squares at the top.
There is no monthly section in the 019!
The weekly section is essentially the same in overall format but is more branded and stylised at the top left. There is no dot-grid in the daily squares and the right page uses regular grids rather than dot-grids.
At the end the 019 offers a full departure form. This wouldn’t have any official use but I guess it would get you in the spirit of traveling? Maybe putting your home address on a document that you might lose when you are out of the country and not in that home isn’t a good idea though!
The biggest differences between the 019 and the Pebble Stationery Co. Traveler’s Regular Sized Undated Planner is that 1) there is no monthly section; 2) the paper is the thicker Midori paper and not Tomoe River (this is still decent fountain p[en friendly paper but it is not Tomoe River!); and 3) the 019 only has enough weeks for half a year! You’d need to of these for a year. This is important to note when we talk about price.
The paper is 52gsm Tomoe River paper. I’m not going to go into to much detail about this paper. It is well known and I show every ink I’ve reviewed on this paper. You can see how this paper writes in any of my reviews. Exceptionally fountain pen friendly paper.
…that has a strong sheen.
I could have started this planner at any time but I’m going to give it an earnest go to see if it can fit into my routine well starting next year. I don’t see any benefit in showing what my planner routine would be and how the is useful to me because its such a subjective thing and also I’m terrible at it. I’m not a good journaler and no-one should be looking to me for info there!
This, in theory, looks like the type of planner that would work for me though. It has all the features that I think I’d use without any extras that I wouldn’t. It is simple but not simplistic – there’s still a decent amount here. I also think it’s an improvement over the standard 019 from Traveler’s Company.
The planner is US$17.99, AU$26. My initial reaction was that this was on the pricier-side when compared to AU$16-18 or US$13 for for the 019. The big and important difference here, though, is that the 019 only lasts for half a year meaning that for a full year’s worth (or 52 total weeks) you will need to buy it again. This actually puts the Pebble Stationery Co. Traveler’s Regular Sized Undated Planner at a distinct price advantage. You just pay half more up front to get a full year. You also get Tomoe River, which I see as an advantage and the difference in thickness between the 019 and the Pebble Stationery Co. Planner is only 1-2mm thicker but has more than double the pages. I think this is good value.
Check out the Navy, Red, Light Blue, and Grey as well as the rest of what Pebble Stationery Co. make!
Thanks again to Pebble Stationer Co. for sending this in for review!
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I received these stationery items free of charge for the purpose of giving an honest review. I was not otherwise compensated and everything here is my own honest opinion. There are no affiliate links.
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