Moses, the ancient Romans, the Chinese under the Shang Dynasty and the North American Siksikaitsitapi all knew one thing: whatever your message, writing on stone is hard. Fast-forward a few thousand years, and one German company is rewriting this ancient wisdom by making a lightweight, portable, readable, durable and sustainable notebook made of stone.
The Findling®, produced by company meyer², is a notebook for the promotional products market made of a combination of 80% limestone “flour”, a waste material from stone quarries, and 20% HDPE (high density polyethylene), commonly used in water pipes and recycled bottles.
While that might sound technical, the savings in terms of sustainability speak for themselves: the production process requires zero water, zero trees, and by their calculations consumes only 10% of the energy and produces less than a third of the CO2 of an analogous paper-based product. It’s made from waste materials, and entirely recyclable.
But of course a Promo Swiss Award, REACH certifications, more-sustainable production processes and all the good intentions in the world only matter if the product does what it claims. It’s a notebook, right? So, how does it write?
Wanting to leave no stone unturned in our investigation, at Open we sat down to test the Findling® with one of our new QS Stone series pens. The paper itself has a silky texture, like the kind you only find on those really expensive, really high-quality books that you barely ever want to let yourself buy. And the writing was smooth, clear, perfectly flowing.
And that’s when we spilled coffee all over it. And rinsed it off with a glass full of warm fizzy water as well. And then vigorously shook it out in a light morning drizzle under a grey Ticino sky. Because one of the best things about a book made of stone is that it’s waterproof. And remarkably tear-resistant.
Perfect, when combined with the right pen, to take with on your next autumn hike in the mountains, a bit of cairn-spotting, or a trip to a humid Swiss bunker. The ancients are long gone, so maybe it’s time we all take a new look at stone.