The Lamy Persona blends modernity with classical design. A brainchild of renown Italian architect and designer Mario Bellini, the Persona features a fluted barrel reminiscent of an ancient Greek column.
First launched in 1990, the Persona was the flagship Lamy fountain pen for 14 years, until it was discontinued in 2004. The cartridge-converter filled fountain pen features a fluted barrel and tubular nib. The pen came in a variety of finishes – platinum, titanium, makrolon (with a palladium cap) as well as black titanium oxide.
The Persona comes seated on a velvety platform inside a specially designed presentation box. The box has a cover which matches the design of the pen itself. It also contains an instruction manual and guarantee card individually signed by a quality inspector. The quality control card is fitting for a high-quality flagship of the brand.
The Lamy Persona is known to be a reliable writer – online reviews have raved about the performance of its unique nib. Apart from the Lamy 2000, the Persona is the only pen which features a distinctly different design from typical Lamy nibs. As expected, the nib is rather stiff and has absolutely no flexibility.
It is worthy to note that the tubular design serves no purpose and is purely aesthetic – it is therefore highly plausible that Lamy discontinued the pen with the intent of standardising the manufacture of their parts. With all due respect to the designer, it is quite likely that the Persona was scrapped as it could never step out of the 2000’s shadow.
The Persona’s ribbed surface undoubtedly gives the pen a distinct appearance, but does not in any way contribute to the writing experience of the pen. That being said, it does have attractive and classy appearance – Lamy has employed this fluted design on most of its premium editions such as the platinum Lamy CP1 and Lamy Swift.
The Lamy Persona has a distinctive clip which is flush with the surface of the cap. The clip is deployed by simply pushing downwards from the cap top. The mechanism feels extremely slick and there is absolutely no wobble in the clip. The mechanism is not necessary as the pen is rather lengthy when posted, meaning the clip would not get in the way when writing. Posting the cap does however result in it becoming top heavy.
The Lamy Persona has been discontinued but it is still available online for a reasonable price and in good condition. Given that the latest Lamy flagship has been the technically superior Dialog 3, prices of the existing Persona should be fairly affordable.
PROS
– Attractive clip mechanism and fluted barrel
– Tubular nib design wraps around feed
– Clean, uninterrupted barrel form
– Posts with a secure click
CONS
– Costly for a cartridge – converter pen
– Converter not readily available now
2 Comments
Add Yours →The old converters are not available, but the new converters work perfectly well in the Persona.
Thanks for sharing, Tim! I am glad that the Persona has been revived, the new one certainly looks slick in black!