Sailor Professional Gear Slim - Black Fine 14k nib

Sailor Fountain pens probably don’t need any introduction and I’ve recently reviewed the Sailor Imperial Black and Pink Gold fountain pens. Today I review the Sailor Professional Gear Slim, in a basic black with silver trim.

If you’re not familiar with the Sailor Fountain Pen family, the Professional Gear Slim is the miniature version of the Professional Gear and the standard edition comes with a 14K nib. Some of the special or limited editions may come with 21K gold, but the standard editions that are readily available usually have 14K nibs.

The good thing about this range is that you can usually choose nib sizes from an extra fine, all the way up to a Zoom nib. This one is a fine, which is much finer than what I would normally choose – the reason behind this is that this pen was accidentally sent to me instead of the Platinum 3776 Bourgogne I ordered and I decided to keep it rather than having it replaced.

This was my very first experience with Sailor pens and I find this nib fine but wet and smooth. This is also a reliable Sailor nib for me, unlike the Imperial Black I reviewed earlier, this pen behaves consistently.

Whilst its too fine for me for most cases, I enjoy using this with my planner, where I prefer a finer nib to help with dry times and squish into small spaces. Also using this with Cosmo Air Light means that the experience (to me anyway) feels a little more cushioned and my lines are a bit wider, so my writing doesn’t look as much like chicken scrawl. I also find it wetter than a Pilot Fine which seems to run dry in my experience.

All in all, if you’re looking for a professional looking gold nib, this is a great choice. Its simple lines will fine in anywhere. And if you end up falling in love and you want something a bit more colourful, or even sparkly, Sailor creates a multitude of beautiful limited editions or store exclusives, there’s bound to be something that suits your style. Having said that, they can be hard to get a hold of and an extremely slippery slope.