On July 30th, the green apple color of the glass pen "Small Apple" began to be sold at "Hirayama Mannendo", a stationery specialty store in Hirosaki (Dotemachi, Hirosaki City, TEL 0172-32-0880 ).

This glass pen is a collaboration between the shop founded in 1913 (Taisho 2) and Hokuyo Glass (Aomori City) known for "Tsugaru Vidro". The barrel of the pen has a motif of lined apples, and the stem of the apple appears on the buttocks. The pen tip is a “brush type” with an angle like a brush, and it is designed to write bold letters at the slanted part.

"Chiisana Ringo" started selling in April this year. At the beginning of the release, it was only red, which imitated red apples, but the owner of the store, Koichi Hirayama, requested blue. “I wanted a refreshing color for summer,” says Hirayama.

According to Mr. Hirayama, the impetus for the development of the glass pen was an interview with Hirayama Mannendo on Marugoto Aomori, a tourist information site run by the Aomori Prefecture Tourism Planning Division. The interview was about local ink, but when I asked the owner, Koichi Hirayama, what he wanted to try, he said, "Local glass pen."

After the interview, Marugoto Aomori approached Hokuyo Glass, and the company also had a glass pen project, so development progressed. Mr. Tomonori Kabeya, the president of Hokuyo Glass, recalls, "I had no idea what kind of glass pen to make, but Mr. Hirayama's experience and knowledge were of great help in development."

There are two types of pen shafts, a thin type (about 15 mm in diameter) and a thick type (about 20 mm in diameter), and in addition to the thin type and medium-thick type of pen tip, there is also a "brush type" that is bent like a brush. . At first, the "brush type" was a failure of a craftsman who tried to make a pen tip straight, but Mr. Hirayama had an idea that stationery fans would like it because it could write bold letters.

“Each piece of Tsugaru Vidro is handmade, and I knew that it would be difficult to add a slight angle to it, but I decided to ask. The angle and size are slightly different, but it has a wonderful handmade taste. A glass pen that originated in Japan and is shaped like a brush tip is rare,” says Mr. Hirayama.

The green apple color is only "brush type" and the price is 16,500 yen. Two types of pen shafts are available.