MUJI – Wire-O Bound Notebook

MUJI recently (well almost 2yrs back) forayed into the Indian market. They opened their first store in Mumbai on 5th August 2016. And now they have 4 stores currently in India with two being in Delhi NCR.

Muji Logo (pic credits: Muji India)

Muji is a Japanese retail brand who has partnered in India with Reliance Industries and the entity name is “Ryohin Keikaku Reliance India Pvt Ltd”.Muji is distinguished by its design minimalism, emphasis on recycling, avoidance of waste in production and packaging, and no-logo or “no-brand” policy.

Muji sells many products household products like apparel, kitchenware, furniture etc. but importantly they have an extensive Stationary Section with a variety of notebooks, pads, pencils, crayons, colors, and pens.

I have been using their stuff for a while now. And the product that I am reviewing is one of the best paper notebooks.

Muji Wire-O Bound Notebook

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DESIGN & BUILD :

The notebook is Wire-O bound A5 size notebook and has translucent plastic front and back cover.  The first page is the thick card paper sheet and similarly the last sheet.

Muji Notebook – Translucent Front Cover

Muji  Notebook – Rear Cover with Card Sheet as the Last Page

Muji Notebook – Card Sheet in the Rear

Muji Notebook – Wire-O Bound

The built quality is top notch and the design is minimalist which is true to the brand name. There is only one sticker pasted in front which gives info about the product.

Muji Notebook – Product Info Sticker on Front Cover

It’s a simple minimalist no-nonsense notebook. Built-Quality is really good.

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PERFORMANCE / QUALITY :

As I have mentioned earlier and I believe most of us all know that the quality of paper as far as using with the fountain pen is concerned is dependent on a lot of parameters like ink resistance, shading, sheen, feathering, bleed-through, paper color, smoothness or texture and few others. Few properties are also dependent with ink properties like shading and sheen.

This is where this notebook shines the most.

This A5 size notebook comes with 90gsm paper and dot grid pattern. The paper color is not super white like Rhodia Dot Pad and is a cream colored paper. The notebook is Made in China.

Muji Notebook – Dot Grid Pattern Paper

Muji Notebook – Dot Grid Cream Colored paper Closeup

Below are the few images of paper when written with different width of pen and different inks. The paper was smooth on both sides of the sheet and the paper was pretty ink resistant.

Muji Notebook – Writing on it – Front Side of Sheet

Muji Notebook – Writing on it – Rear Side of Sheet

Muji Notebook – Writing on it – Angled Closeup

Muji Notebook – Ink Smudge – Closeup

Muji Notebook – Writing on It – Closeup

Muji Notebook – Writing on it – Rear side of the Sheet – Closeup

As you can see from the above images the paper fared very well in most of the parameters. It is a good paper and very good at resisting most of the ink. There is almost no Bleedthrough/Ghosting on the rear side and also there is no feathering too.

As far as sheen is concerned is concerned it was low and same is with shading.

Performance summary is as follows:

• Ink Resistance: High
• Paper Colour: Cream
• Paper Texture: Smooth
• Feathering: None
• Bleed-through: None
• Shading: Low
• Sheen: Medium

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VALUE :

This A5 size is priced at INR 450 which is actually on the higher side. But quality is top notch.

There are some better-priced options available in the market with the likes of Rhodia.

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CONCLUSION :

Like mentioned earlier the notebook is minimalist in Design and Quality of notebook and paper are both very good.

I think there are some better options out there with the likes of Rhodia Dot Pad or Anokhi Bahi Khata Notebook.

This can be bought only at Muji Stores in India.