I've basically been all over Ensso's products ever since I got acquainted with their fantastic Piuma fountain pens and have been a huge fanboy ever since. However, I really never looked much beyond the Piuma and the XS minimalist pocket fountain pen until now.
A completely different product in the catalog of the USA-based design studio is the Ensso Pen Uno. Not a fountain pen this time around, but a gel pen based on the Pilot Hi-Tec C refill. It was actually Ensso's first pen project back in the day, and without a doubt the most unique product they make. In my last order from them, Carlo (the man behind the brand) included this Pen Uno in raw aluminium for me to review - so here we go!
The Pen uno is an oddball pen. It almost looks like a modernist take on Harry Potter's magic wand, not like something you'd write with. The super-sleek cylindrical aluminium tube consists of just two major pieces: a thin, long rod and a short, slightly wider cylinder at the base of the pen. Minimal products continue to fascinate me through their simplicity. I can't say I'm a minimalist at heart (I may be a bit of a hoarder...), but the design style really speaks to me. Ensso generally knows their way around minimal product design quite well, with clean lines, uncluttered and precisely machined. That's no different with the Pen Uno, this pen is about as barebones as it gets.
The Pen Uno is an all-aluminium pen. It's available in a bunch of anodized finishes, as well as this limited production run in raw, untreated aluminium. A limited edition in solid brass is also available (for the time being), which will add some heft to this thin and compact pen.
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| The Parker-style refill gives a good idea of how thin this pen really is! |
The mechanism on how to use the pen, basically IS the pen. Twist the wider grip section and it slides down over the barrel like a nut on a bolt, revealing the needlepoint tip of the Pilot Hi-Tec C refill. It takes A BUNCH of twists to fully move the section down (there is a positive stop when it reaches the end), so it takes a while if you'd open it like you would any twist cap pen. The real (and much faster!) way to open and close the Pen Uno is to give the section a firm flick of the thumb and watch it spin up or down on itself. I couldn't figure out how to do this until after a few days of using the pen. But after a while, it just worked. Perhaps the threads just needed some breaking in? It's like a bolt-action pen: once you get the hang of it, it's really fun to use. Hand this pen to a random person, and I doubt they'll figure out how to use it.
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| L to R: Blackwing pencil, Modern Fuel pencil, Tactile Turn Glider, Ensso Pen Uno, Lamy Safari, Lamy 2000. |
The Pen Uno has a fairly 'normal' length of 13cm (5.12"), but normal ends there. At just 5.3mm (0.23") thick around the 'barrel' (if you can even call it that), Ensso claims it to be (one of) the thinnest pens in production, which is not at all hard to believe. The barrel on itself would be almost unusable, so that's where the grip section comes in with a more manageable 9.5mm wide.
Manageable is relative of course. We're talking barely the thickness of a standard wood cased pencil, so needless to say that if thin pens are not your game, the Pen Uno probably won't blow you away. It didn't blow me away either but never felt uncomfortable to use, even when I was taking notes in class. The lightweight aluminium construction (just 10g total) makes the writing experience fatigue-free.
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| Ironically, when I went to photograph this pen I noticed the refill had run out, perfectly illustrating what I don't like about the Pen Uno! |
Unfortunately, a thin pen comes with the restriction of using an even thinner refill. This comes in the form of a Pilot Hi-Tec C Coleto refill, which is a thin multi-pen type of refill. The obvious issue with this kind of refill is of course that it doesn't last awfully long.
The Pilot Hi-Tec-C is a really unique type of refill and has a cult following because of the precise and crisp fine needlepoint tip. The 0.5mm tip size (or the 0.4mm variant that is supplied with the pen) offers a good balance between a fine line and ease of use (I find that the ultra-fine Hi-Tec C refills can sometimes be a bit finicky to use). The gel ink flows smoothly and is crisp and dark.
The Ensso Pen Uno is a peculiar but clever piece of design that is very well made (a constant across all Ensso products). Sure, the slender profile may not be THE most comfortable ever, and the tiny refills are a bit limiting when you plan to use it intensively. But this pen is a conversation starter for sure, and a really cool pen to fidget with. At 45$ the Pen Uno is a fun pen to try without breaking the bank, and it would make for a great gift! PS: It's also available as a mechanical pencil.
This product was sent to me by Ensso so I could write this review. I was in no way influenced in the making of this review, the opinions shared in this review are completely my own! This post does not contain affiliate links, purchases made with the discount code from this sponsor are not affiliated.
