Journal Journey: Hobonichi Techo Avec

Hello my Lovelies, 🙂

it is the middle of the week and as we would say in German: „Bergfest“ 😉 It means that it is time for a little party because there are only two days till weekend. 😀

Last year I started a road trip with you. We were on the road to explore different journals and their paper quality. So I thought today would be great to have a closer look at Hobonichi Techo. They produce planners with and without dates.

Hobonichi – Who?

Hobonichi Techo is a Japanese stationery brand which offers planners, pouches, pens and lots more of accessories. The famous Hobonichi Techo was born in 2001 and it is a planner which is loved by many people around the world. The history is really incredible how the notebook/journal developed to the one it is today and this year they celebrate their 20th anniversary.

For the brand it isn’t just a planner for your appointments, it is for your life events. To be honest, life events sounds great, like fun and excitement, just as life should be.

You can get it different variations and size. In my case we will have a look at the Hobonichi Techo Cusin Avec 2021.

Hobonichi Techo Cusin Avec

I have the A5 size at home because for me and my notes it is the best size to use. The Avec is one planner split into a two-book set. The first one is from January to June and the second half is from July to December. Both notebooks have a different coloured front cover so you can easily tell them apart. The first one is yellow and the second one is blue. Both look really minimalistic, because the magic happens inside. 😉

When you open the notebook it will lay flat and it doesn’t matter how far you are into the year. It is really comfortable to write in it. And for those of you who likes to paste and work a lot with glue it can get quite bulky without loosing the cuteness. 😉

Inside the Avec

When you open up the planner you will see a year at the glance and the last and the next year. After that you can see the year with three months on one page. For each day of the month is a line and beneath the months is some space for notes. The paper is squared.

After that you will find a monthly overview over two pages. The days are in squares. The week starts with Monday.
Then the weekly overviews are starting for the first/last six months of the year. The days are broken down by hours from five a.m to four a.m.

The cover page for the month is minimalistic. There is only the month written down in Japanese as well as in Roman in letters. There is a quote in Japanese as well. (If you want to find out what it means, it’s a lot of fun to use google translate if you can’t read Japanese. Getting the meaning can be a bit challenging though – but quite some fun too.)

Finally the month starts with one day per page.
In the top left corner is the number and the date name. There is the Japanese sign for the week day and a little moon as well, showing the moon phase for that day. Next to it are five check marks.

Below this the center of the page has the hours written down and a thin vertical line separates it from free space. Beneath the hours you have more free space.

Next to the quotes, mentioned further above, is a little monthly calendar where the day is marked.

After the six months there are some further pages for notes. Then you have a page with a time table, favourites, my 100 and a few more pages in Japanese. They look really interesting and I will need some time to figure it out what it all means 🙂

If you ask yourself where you can write down your personal information, well the space for this is at the last page of the planner. Pretty awesome is that the little mascot says thank you at the last page. And every Hobonichi has its product number printed inside as well.

The Paper

It is graph paper and each square side is 3.7mm which Hobonichi said would be optimal for writing comfort. The lines are so thin that you can use them or when you would like to be creative they will melt into the background. The thickness of the paper reminds me of Tomoe River paper with 52 gsm. I would guess that this paper of Hobonichi isn’t thicker than 65gsm. It is shiny and ghosting and bleeding can happen.

The surface of the paper is really sleek which makes it easy to write or draw on it. I personally like to write on it with fountain pen, ballpoint pen or a Muji pen. Even watercolouring is possible which I tried. 😉 The paper wrinkles a little bit but it is totally fine.

You can use highlighters and markers without any problem. In my very first Hobonichi Techo I used Mildliners and they worked great.

Washi tape, stemps and stickers stick perfectly to the paper.

My Thoughts

I really adore Hobonichi Techo Cusin Avec in A5. It isn’t really heavy and the paper is very robust. I am using it for my blogging, so I can write down some ideas or thought about a new blogpost every day. This is maybe the only ready-made planner system which I really prefer.

One of the greatest things is that you have the opportunity to buy accessories. I have a black cover and one which is clear on top. The black cover has a pen loop and two book marks.

If you have a shop in your country where you can buy it, that is great. It isn’t so easy to buy in a shop in Germany so I usually order it on the website or buy it when I’m in Japan. If you order online, a great part is that they show you the taxes in advance so you can decide if you really want to order it or shop it somewhere else.

I know that a lot of people are afraid of the paper weight because it is so thin but check out the website for their examples what you can do with a Hobonichi. The paper is stronger than you might think at first glance.

The Hobonichi Techo has a huge variety and it is amazing what you can do with it.

Wisdom of the Day: Don’t get scared by thin paper, it can surprise you. 😉

Love to you all and stay healthy,

Chrissi
The Evil Journalista