After going through my posts, there really isn’t much outside of reviews. Hence, here’s a little article/how-to on making a custom case for all your pen-related goodies. I was inspired by the fact that pen cases are expensive. The nicer they are, the more expensive they get. It’s important to keep your expensive pens safe, and it’s a good feeling to have your not-so-expensive pens displayed nicely. The case above, I actually found on the curb, with a bunch of other discarded household items a few blocks away from home. It was a case with a plastic insert that was used to hold K-Cups (yuck.) for a Keurig Coffee machine. After bringing the case home, and easily cutting out the plastic lining, I was left with a nice looking case that was a great size to hold a few pens. The foam is a high density foam that I was able to take home from work. I measured out the spaces needed for the pens, then used a razor blade to carefully remove the sections I had marked off. I have yet to try it, but Pelican Cases makes a foam with 1/2″ pre-scored cubes that can easily be ripped out to accomodate whatever you want to put in there. Amazon has these sheets of foam available in a bunch of sizes/configurations for a reasonable price. I feel much better having these pens in a case than I do floating around in a pen cup, or put away in their original packaging/boxes. Total cost for this case? $0.00. So really, keeping an eye out for a box at thrift stores, and cutting some foam yourself is a really cheap and effective way to keep your collection safe.
Post up pictures of your pen storage in the comments!
Related Reading:
edjelley.com - Fountain Pen, Ink, and Stationery Reviews 
http://i.imgur.com/g3AlOAv.jpg
Nice!
Nice job Ed, mine is almost as cheap but not as classy. A discarded China adaptation of the venerable Gerstner machinist tool box and I fill it with the pen trays from GoPens. Sorry I’m not sure how to post these right in the blog comment but here is mine.
Thanks! Yours looks good as well. Those trays are probably much more handy than cutting foam.
Bob, is this the one I saw on the FPG forum? From Harbor Freight?
Brilliant idea! Thanks for that.
I’ve been looking all over for this type of packing foam, so thanks for the Amazon Link.
I made something similar to this with USPS flat rate boxes and packing foam to store my coin collection.
So how do you remove the foam while still keeping a smooth surface at the bottom of the cut?
I just carefully got in there with a razor and bent the foam a bit. You’d be surprised how easily and cleanly the foam comes out when the sides are properly cut. The inside is by no means perfect, but nothing that the pen itself won’t hide.
This is a very resourceful means of pen storage. Thanks for sharing your idea and method. I will keep an eye out for materials like this.
It was really easy! Pretty much any box that can fit the length of a pen is fair game.
Love the foam idea, thanks
No problem!
There’s a cigar store in my neighborhood that sells empty wooden cigar boxes for $1. I found one that looks nice, has a clear window in the lid, and even already had a plastic insert (that used to hold cigars) that I could lay my pens in. I just covered the plastic insert with a piece of black fabric so it looks nicer.
Awesome! I’ve been meaning to get to the one by me. Sounds like you found a good one!
Not sure if you could remove the outline you did there to score out the foam, but another suggestion is outlining in chalk so that if you don’t cut it exactly right, you can dust away the outline
Definitely a much better idea than using a sharpie like I did! Thanks for the suggestion!
From the quick checklist I search for the obtainable of third get together ink cartridges via a creditable seller like Amazon.