Monday, October 26, 2020

REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN

REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
Otto Hutt is celebrating their centennial anniversary, and they're taking the opportunity to make a push towards the higher end market. Pretty much their entire celebration year is built around a unique limited edition at a price point significantly higher than you'd typically expect from the German brand!    

Celebrating anniversaries with expensive limited editions seems to be a trend more than ever. Lamy released the 2000 50th anniversary Black Amber a few years ago, Platinum had their exuberantly priced Prime Platinum last year (at 10K, clearly not an easy pen to move, even though 'only' 100 were made!), very recently Diplomat announced the pricey 90th-anniversary celebration 'Zepp', and Otto Hutt celebrates its centennial with the all-new Design C. But limited editions are a tricky business to get right. Otto Hutt took a gamble with their new Design C, so how did they do? 
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
Before we start: when I say 'expensive', I mean expensive! The Design C is a 2500€ pen. It costs almost 5 times as much as their current flagship pen, the Design 07 (reviewed HERE), and it was admittedly very hard to shake that thought, while testing the Design C. A pricetag like that inevitably changes your perception about a product. I mean, they sent a pair of gloves along, urging me to be very careful with their review sample. That sort of sets the tone. 

On a completely unrelated sidenote, the attentive reader will have noticed that the Design C is the first Otto Hutt that's not marked by a number. Although in this case, the C is used as a Roman numeral, so it represents 100 - the 100th anniversary for Otto Hutt. Clever!
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
Let's actually look at the pen! The Design C is a complete overhaul of the design language of Otto Hutt. In a way, it follows closely to the latest Otto Hutt Design 03 (reviewed HERE). With the help of designer Mark Braun, an ultra-minimal pen is brought to the table in a way that suits their evolution towards more modern, and clean aesthetics. Effectively transitioning the brand away from the 'old' Otto Hutt with more traditional looks and a lot of silver finishes. But it's exactly that history in producing various writing instruments in silver that is still a big part of the concept of the Design C. It's a 71-gram chunk of solid sterling silver. 
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
Quite literally, This is quite a chunk of pen you're holding in your hand! Monolithic, straight and mostly featureless, with slightly domed - but unadorned - finials. It's extremely simple, yet certainly striking, in a way. The proportions of the Design C follow the golden ratio. But the golden ratio looks a bit weird on pen, so you get a design with a relatively short cap and long barrel.
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
Stripped of unnecessary features, the Design C is maybe most characterized by the two small solid 18k gold 'indices' right above and below the seam between cap and barrel. These two dots functionally act as a roll-stopper for both cap and barrel, but aesthetically they break up the, mostly unadorned, sterling silver surface of the Design C. 

I must say, the perfectly polished sterling silver surface is a bit daunting. It's a fingerprint magnet of course, but sterling silver also notoriously doesn't stay immaculate and beautifully polished! Call it patina, but after two or three days that pristine pen you see in the pictures started to look a bit less pristine... and yes, that's WITH the gloves and extremely careful handling!
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
 REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
Some smaller details like the engravings on the piston knob are etched in a tiny and neat font, making them stand out very little in the grand scheme of things. Perhaps those engravings look a bit too clean though, it may have been nice if they had done those by hand, to signify the skill and craftsmanship that's involved in working with precious metals. Then again, it's a minimal design they were after, so I guess minimal branding fits the bill. 
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
The Design C comes presented in a very large presentation box. Included are a polishing cloth, a nice booklet, and a bottle of permanent blue ink, which seems to be a fairly nice darker blue color. I didn't dare to put a permanent ink in this loaner pen though, so I went with a more benign fill of Pelikan Edelstein Sapphire instead.    
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
Also included in the box is a custom leather pen case. It's wet-formed around the shape of the Design C, and it looks quite ok from afar. Unfortunately, the second you pick up the case, you'll immediately feel that it's not the kind of case you put a very expensive pen in. It feels light and cheap, and the edges are weirdly sharp, to the point where I think it might add more micro-scratches to the delicate finish of the Design C than it prevents (ok, maybe that's an exaggeration, but it still doesn't feel very premium). Additionally, it's a very awkward size for something that's custom-fitted for this specific pen. The entire case is bulky, and the flap extends extremely far beyond the actual length of the pen. Surely for a 2500$ pen, the case is overall underwhelming.
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
L to R: Ennso Piuma, Pelikan M1005, Montblanc 149, Otto Hutt Design 06, Design 07, Design C, Lamy Safari, Lamy 2000
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
The Design C is not a terribly large pen, but it's extremely dense and space-optimized. At 14cm/ 5.51" closed, the Design C fits right in with other Otto Hutt pens, that's to say: not too large. However, the C turns into a notably large pen when uncapped! Of all pens in this lineup, the Design C starts second to smallest in line, but ends up as the largest pen in the hand at 13.5cm/ 5.31". That's impressive and functional. 
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
The cap takes about two (very smooth!) turns to uncap. Underneath, the satin black section creates a stark contrast with the shiny silver outside. The stainless steel section is PVD coated, and at least on this well-tested sample that passed a lot of hands before me, the finish is still flawless so it seems durable enough to hold up. The wavy texture of the section is strongly reminiscent of the Lamy Persona/Imporium (reviewed HERE). It provides a secure grip, but it's quite uncommon so it definitely takes some time to get used to. There's a relatively steep step towards the barrel of the pen, but the section provides enough space so you don't have to rest your fingers on the step. Together with the comfortable diameter of 11-12 mm, the section is overall quite pleasant and comfortable to hold.

The solid silver and stainless steel construction of the Design C makes for an incredibly solid-feeling pen. Unfortunately, it's quite noticeably back-weighted, because of the complex mechanism for the filling system that we'll touch on in a minute. I'm quite ok with heavier pens, but the trick is having all that weight balance properly in your hand - the Design C is noticeably a bit off, in that regard.
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
The cause of the back-weighted balance is Otto Hutt's Pull+Twist piston filling mechanism, specially designed for this pen. It's a big selling point for the Design C. Undoubtedly a lot of engineering and designing effort went into its creation... But I'm simply not blown away by it. The piston engages by pulling the piston knob out a couple millimeters, after which it functions like a normal piston filler. It's more complex and finicky than it looks though, and the fiddling it takes to activate and deactivate the mechanism distracts from the user experience. When the mechanism is actually engaged and you're ready to fill the pen, it is a bit squeaky and feels very light and unsubstantial (like a captured converter, not a proper piston mechanism). There's a bit of play on the mechanism as well - not too surprising, given how many moving parts there are! - which sometimes rattles just the tiniest bit. As I said, kudos to Otto Hutt for trying to do something different... but I think it needs a bit more fine-tuning to feel as premium as it should.
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
The nib is a #6 18k gold one. It's made by JoWo and sits on a stock JoWo feed, but the nib design itself is completely custom. I quite like how it's two-tone, but the plating isn't separated by the imprint itself. Instead, only the o | h logo - Otto Hutt's new branding style - is centered on the nib, with a few simple lines surrounding it. It's quite different and not too cluttered - I like it. 

I like even better how it writes. A pretty regular JoWo experience, I guess, but JoWo makes killer gold nibs so that's not a bad thing. It's perfectly smooth, responsive, and definitely on the wetter side. It has a slight bit of bounciness to it for a cushioned writing experience. The nib also doesn't dry out over extended periods of time. Excellent marks for anything concerning the nib and overall writing experience. 
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
If you haven't read Antony's (UKFountainpens) interview with designer Mark Braun,  I'd suggest you go do that before reading on. It's interesting to get a look in the head of the designer, but it also highlights some of the marketing around the Design C that I don't get behind. 

For one, Mark Braun insists on categorizing the C as 'Democratic luxury'. In his eyes, you only need to buy this one, high-quality pen and have that for the rest of your life. Surely, that's an ideology. While this is most certainly an heirloom-quality pen, it is most likely not the only pen you'll ever buy, and especially not the only pen you'll use every day... Certainly, I wouldn't feel comfortable using a 2,5K pen every day of the week. I also don't think anybody who's not deeply into pens would shell out 2500$ on a whim, and have the Design C as their be-all-end-all pen. Having a heirloom-quality, EDC pen definitely doesn't mean it has to cost as much as the Design C. 

Secondly, using the term 'Democratic luxury' is also a bit contradictory. Being a piece of democratic luxury would imply moving away from a business model that uses limited availability and exclusivity as a way to control their brand image, and prices that intrinsically target only the lucky few. If 2500$ for a limited edition pen is no longer viewed as 'exclusive', please let me know, because that would mean my perception of pricing and accessibility is quite far off! Funnily enough, in his interview with Anthony, Mark Braun also admits that this pen is very expensive BECAUSE it is an anniversary edition and therefore more exclusive, which contradicts once again his entire reasoning.
REVIEW: OTTO HUTT DESIGN C FOUNTAIN PEN
Remember how I started this review, pointing out that even Otto Hutt's top-of-the-line Design 07 doesn't come nowhere near the Design C's hefty retail price of 2436€ (2380$ without VAT) from retailers like our site sponsor La Couronne Du Comte (Though you can get 10% off with our discount code 'penthusiast'!) While markups like these are certainly not unheard of for limited editions from well-established high-end brands like Montblanc, Namiki, etc., it's not something every brand can justify doing. Even though I'd consider Otto Hutt to be a premium brand, this is uncharted price territory for them, so they don't necessarily have the customer base and loyal following that expects to pay this much for a pen. TL;DR - It's not a Montblanc Writer's edition that can pull off an exorbitant price, 'just because'!

That being said, I think the Otto Hutt Design C is a good pen in most ways - except maybe the filling system - and even an exceptional pen in certain ways. I, for one, am obviously quite a big fan of the minimal and futuristic design approach they took, and for once I think it's an example of a pen where a collaboration with a famous designer DOES work out quite well (I'm looking at you, Visconti Iopenna!). I'm sure the target audience for this pen exists somewhere out there, but they may just have to still find Otto Hutt on their path. I'm definitely curious to see if the Design C marks the first step in an effort from Otto Hutt to position their brand (even more) upmarket!

Note: This product was sent on loan by Otto Hutt, 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.

2 comments: