No, I’m not going on a Safari holiday. Although I have had a week of leave, and I might have been able to make the time to enjoy a Safari trip, but my initial plans have deviated again.
I had planned to see what Timed Blocked Planning could be of use to me after viewing a post of Writing at Large. I quickly looked at how I could go about this, but to no avail. Somehow, I just lacked the discipline to work through a tightly planned schedule. I had the feeling that I had little margin and this in a week where I really wanted to enjoy leave. I need to be able to prepare myself better and will look into efficiently scheduling time to finish all my to-do lists.
As far as the Safari is concerned, I am of course talking about the Lamy Safari. The last week my attention was drawn to the Lamy Safari by chance. For example, on the insta of Lamy_Global an overview of their Lamy Safari special editions as from 2004 appeared. Very useful to keep a Safari overview, because every year a new Safari SE appears, and by new I actually mean a new livery. I’ve also been on the hunt for the 2017 Petrol edition for some time now. This pen appears to be very popular and sought after. I can proudly inform you that I am the owner of this beautiful pen as of today. Discovered by chance on a second-hand site in Belgium. The pen is in unused perfect condition and comes from a shop that has been closed for a few years. It was worth driving back and forth for this. I did pay 47 Euro for this pen, but given the reputation of this pen, I think it’s worth it.
The first generation Lamy Safari was launched in 1980 and was available in three colours: Terracotta Orange, Savannah Green and Charcoal Black. It’s a cartridge/converter pen of which the design is simple, minimalistic, solid and clearly recognizable. The minimalist design comes from the Bauhaus principle: simple designs that are beautiful, functional, and can be mass-produced.
The body of the pen is made of ABS (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene) plastic. This plastic is very strong and can be found in toys (such as LEGO), car parts, and many everyday products. Another nice thing about the Safari concept is that the Safari is also available as a ballpoint pen, rollerball and mechanical pencil. Whatever your favorite writing device is, Safari has it.
The Safari is very light, just under 17 gr. ready to write. The 1.2 cm body is certainly not the narrowest. The Safari is equipped with a steel nib, available in a variety of sizes. The nice thing is that for the left-handers there is a LH nib (actually a slight oblique) that writes really well. The nibs can be interchanged without any effort. My preference is for the dark nibs. The grip has an ergonomic triangular shape and is widely considered to be the ideal pen to start with. I may have forgotten to mention one thing: the clearly recognizable and useful clip of the Safari is a real eye-catcher.
The Lamy Safari’s success has been the springboard of other Lamy fountain pens: the Al-Star, the Vista and the Lx. These pens are more expensive and are made of a different material, such as aluminum.
The only downside of Lamy is that they use their own cartridges, the T10. I therefore wonder whether there will not be one standard for this in the long term, somewhat similar to what it has done with mobile phone chargers.
Am I now on my way to collecting all variants of the Safari? No, this is not my intention. I do try to add those special edition pens that I think are really an added value, of course purely instinctively. The new special editions of 2024 have now appeared here and there. This is the pink cliff and violet blackberry livery. In the meantime I ordered them from my favorite store. They seem to be special in such way that, I think, it is the first time that they do a ‘Frankensteining’. I didn’t really know the concept of Frankensteining either, but it comes down to the fact that different parts of fountain pens are interchanged. Since the grip and the barrel are different in color, it resembles a form of frankensteining. So my heart says… please buy 🙂
Here are the Lamy Safari’s special editions that I own and my reason for owning it:
- 2017 Petrol edition: a grail pen for many Safari collectors. I chased it and finally owned it since today, 18/2/24.
- 2021 Savannah green and terra red: 40 years after the release of the first Lamy Safari fountain pen. I like this relaunch.
- 2022 Strawberry and cream: I like strawberry cream.
- 2024 Pink cliff and violet blackberry: Seems to be Safari is for the first time into frankensteining.
What are your experiences with the Lamy Safari? Is this pen a total no or does it make you move? In other words, have you fallen into the rabbit hole of the Lamy Safari? Looking for your comment 🙂
Below pictures form Lamy Global instagram, an overview of the special editions as from 2004:
Peacock pens 
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