On Notebooks: Moleskine vs Field Notes
5th of April, 2011 · 22 Comments
I make no secret that I like owning and using quality products. I’ve made no secret that I love using notebooks and writing in analogue. And I’ve made no secret of my love for Moleskine products.
At work, I needed a steno pad at my desk. Already being a fan of fine analogue products, and Moleskine not having this type of product, I decided to order a Field Notes steno pad. While I was at it, I ordered a 3-pack of plain notebooks, a product that competes directly with the Moleskine Cahier I’ve typed so much about.
For the purpose of this article, I will refer to to the Moleskine Cahier notebook as Cahier, and Field Notes books as Field Notes.
similarities
Both Field Notes and Cahier books are the same size: 3½ x 5½ inches. They both have rounded corners, but Field Notes corners have a larger radius. They ship in similar packaging.
I think it’s interesting the Field Notes have plainer packaging than the Cahier. Smaller, too. And less yellow.
And that’s just about that for similarities. In every other way I’ve been able to measure, these books are different.
materials
The books are made of three materials: a cover, paper, and a binding agent.
Cahier covers feel a little thicker than Field Notes. It’s pretty subtle, and I’m not sure most folks would notice it if they weren’t looking for it, but there you go. It’s really difficult for me to put a value judgement on this at this time. I’m gonna have to wait and see.
The books have different paper types. Field Notes is very straight forward. Printed on the inside back cover, it says, “Innards: Boise Offset Smooth 50#T ‘White.’” I really liked that paper when I worked for a printer. It’s what I made my own notebooks with, what I printed my own materials on.
All Moleskine products use Folio Ivory paper. It’s a great paper and a joy to write on, but I have no idea what it really is. It could well be custom made for/by Moleskine, and it is a superb paper. I went out and shopped pens for a couple weeks to find the best pen for that paper.
I use black, blue, red, and green pens. They look a little harsh and unsophisticated on white paper. They look idealized on the ivory.
Also, you get more pages, 64, with a Cahier, but I don’t think that’s an advantage, believe it or not. By the time you’re done using a book, it’s really abused. I suspect the Field Notes books, with only 48 pages, will be less decrepit by the time they’re full.
Lastly, the last sixteen pages in a Cahier book are micro-perforated, making tearing the pages out easy and clean. It’s a blessing and a curse. Easily tearing out pages is great, but easily foldable pages with a built-in weakness isn’t so great. No tear out pages in the Field Notes.
Moleskine wins on this one, but only by a bit. Boise paper is made in the U.S. and feels great. Moleskine paper is ivory, and it feels perfect to write on. And I’ll level with you: I enjoy just touching that paper just for the sake of touching it. And I like Moleskine’s choice of ivory over white. Nothing wrong with white paper, but something so right with the shade of ivory Moleskine chose.
Then there’s the binding. Cahier’s bindings are stitched [source], Field Notes are stapled [source]. On the surface, I’d say stitched is obviously stronger, but Coudal.com keeps posting photos of Field Notes in action, and they sure do take some abuse. I suspect stitching would make Field Notes books prohibitively expensive, and time will tell if it’s an issue. If it’s not, then kudos to them for doing it cheaper.
design
A major selling point for the Cahier notebook was how dead simple it is. There’s nothing printed on it at all. The logo is on the back cover, near the bottom, and it’s embossed, not printed.
It turns out that over time, having a notebook you can’t tell which end is up on is kind of a drag. I fixed that with spray paint and a stencil (it’s fascinating that I picked Futura bold—read on). There’s a pretty good argument that says if you have to modify your product with spray paint and a stencil, it’s not perfect.1 There’s also nowhere very good to write your name and phone number down in case you misplace the thing.
The Field Notes book, on the other hand, is a mess of printing all over the place. I worried it’d be a pain and a distraction, but it turns out it’s charming. They use Futura(!) to typeset everything, and it looks great. The kerning is awesome, and the placement is perfect.
The inside back cover has a 5-inch ruler printed in it, along with a list of 30 ways to use your Field Notes book. The inside of the front cover has a place for your name, email address, the date and place you started using the book, the date and place you finished it, and a box for “pertinent coordinates.” I’m not sure what other people use that box for, but it’s pretty prominent for something so vague and weird. I may simply write down my home’s GPS coordinates.
An empty Field Notes book is chock full of personality and humor. Then you start writing and drawing in it, and it gets even better.
Every Moleskine book has a pocket for “notes or clippings.” The Cahier books are no exception. What they did was glue an extra flap of cover inside the back cover. Every last pocket-sized Cahier book I’ve ever used has fallen apart and required taping up. So good job for putting a pocket in there, but bad job for allowing it to fall apart every single time.
I imagine the Field Notes guys looked at it, considered the pocket carefully, and realized they couldn’t do a pocket that’d be worth the cost, so printed a bunch of humorous stuff in there instead. I’m glad they did.
other stuff
I don’t consider myself a patriot by any stretch of the imagination. As a matter of fact, the first and only time I’ve ever been proud to be an American was when President Obama was elected. It’s sort of slid just a smidge since.
For all that, I’d rather buy the book made by a skilled pressman in the U.S. than from whoever assembles them in China and Italy.2
If nothing else, buying Moleskine means my books require way more fuel to get to me. Buying Field Notes is a lot more local, and thus more ecologically friendly. Plus, skilled labor is something we should be celebrating and encouraging. Unless you’re a Republican. In that case, never mind.
On the topic of buying local, I’m a little sad I can only get Field Notes via the Internet, while Moleskine books are available at the local Barnes and Noble. On the other hand, it is fun to watch the shipment travel from Illinois to my mailbox here in California. So we take the good with the bad.
conclusion
Yes, there is a conclusion. Field Notes and Moleskine both make great products. There’s enough room in the world for both of them. Moleskine makes a second-to-none reporter notebook (I’m a reporter!) and their large plain notebook is simply a work of art you get to write in (and the pockets in both are usable).
Field Notes makes no such products.3 They aren’t competing there. They’re competing in the pocket sized notebook market. And though I don’t like the paper quite as much in a Field Notes book, I like everything else more.
I like my reporter notebook and my large plain notebook, but it’s unlikely I’ll buy another pack of Cahiers since I’m already putting together my next order of Field Notes products (I’ll be ordering “The Kit”).
Oh, and Cahier books are available in four colors. Field Notes books are available in a near-infinite variety of colors because the Field Notes guys get a good idea, print a run, and you have ‘em till they run out. It adds to the fun of the thing.
Oh, and Field Notes included a “General-Purpose Band of Rubber” in my order. That band has unironically made my Moleskine reporter notebook better.
I hope there’s some 5½ x 8½ notebooks in the future. That’d make a great thing greater.
- If you have to add lime to your beer, your beer’s probably not very good, either. ↩
- “Moleskine books are printed and bound in China and designed and assembled in Italy.” So binding isn’t assembling? ↩
- Interestingly, I got into this whole thing because Field Notes makes a product Moleskine doesn’t: the steno pad, which deserves its own review. ↩
Rev. Cameron Errea
on Tuesday, April 5th, 2011 at 5:46 pm
You’re such a nerd.
and cool it with the Republican bashing… please.
Critical Creig » Moleskine Now Makes Bags
on Sunday, May 8th, 2011 at 10:54 am
[...] I said, the bags are perfectly Moleskine, but like the cahier books, too plain for the real world. This plainness is perfectly fine for notebooks, but I feel it sort [...]
The Competition
on Thursday, June 2nd, 2011 at 12:35 pm
[...] Creig wrote up a comparison of our notebooks to the leading brand. We think there’s plenty of room in the pocket notebook market for variety, and we’ve [...]
Justin
on Thursday, June 2nd, 2011 at 9:34 pm
It’s really hard to not give in to Field Notes and their awesome branding. That said, I’ve used both Moleskine Cahiers and Field Notes and I’ve always been a lot happier with the Cahier as an everyday carry notebook. Field Notes tend to fall apart on me while Cahiers have proved to be very rugged. On top of that, you get more pages and they cost less.
Cuprohastes
on Thursday, June 2nd, 2011 at 9:47 pm
The advantage of the All Pupose rubber band is that you can also use it to add extra grip for opening jars.
The Fieldnotes pencils seem to be re-badged Ticonderoga Envirostik pencils made of California cedar (And this is a good ting, they’re good pencils and made with renewable wood).
Also the Field Notes books are printed in brown ink for their ruled and gridded paper, which is a lot more subtle than black and a refreshing change from blue.
Also – I’ve owned Cahirs and Fieldnotes, and they stand up to a beating about equally well but in the end, the fieldnotes looks less tatty than the black cahirs (Note: I’m referring to the card bound cahirs, not the newer vinyl re-inforced types.)
Generally speaking if I want a small disposable pocket book, I’d go with Field Notes. If I need a bound book, which Field notes don’t do – it’s Moleskine.
In fact the only complaint I’ve ever had against Field Notes (hich I often give as small presents to friends) is when they dis-continued their wonderful calendar!
barry
on Friday, June 3rd, 2011 at 11:58 am
I enjoyed your review, I have found although I like moleskine paper, I like the field notes books better.
I think a four year stint in the Marines would make you a better American, you kinda suck in that area.
Allen
on Saturday, June 4th, 2011 at 6:45 pm
Next up, you’ve got to give grid-lines a try — http://doanepaper.bigcartel.com/
Creig
on Saturday, June 4th, 2011 at 6:53 pm
It’s fascinating that Justin and I have had the exact opposite experience with the different books. I can totally get behind why he chooses Moleskine, it’s just that I choose Field Notes for the exact same reasons. We must be hard on books in different ways.
I LOVE Cuprohastes’ idea of using the Band of Rubber for opening jars. I also agree about brown v. blue. And we share the same major complaint with the calendar.
Barry’s must have missed my self-applied title: CRITICAL Creig. I’m critical of things, including the U.S. government, policies, politics, and social norms. Shall I call you a fanboy, Barry?
Allen, if you can get somebody to send me some notebooks, I’ll gladly review them.
Thanks everybody for taking the time to provide feedback. It’s good to know I provided something worthwhile to you.
Robert
on Saturday, June 4th, 2011 at 10:27 pm
I have often been curious about Field Notes and Doane, but have yet to actually try any of their products. The Moleskine Cahiers and Volants are available to me locally, so I’ve been able to try them out.
I got the red Moleskine pocket Cahier, and it’s held up relatively well. However, after a bit of occasional exposure to damp conditions and lots of flexing around, the cover has begun to feel more “sueded”, and has left red stains on a number of pages. The pocket in the back separated on me very quickly, though I never used it.
The paper didn’t handle my fountain pens well at all, so I generally stuck to Jetstreams and pencils. After some water and sweat exposure, the Jetstream ink slightly spread and seemed to lock itself into the paper very deeply, easily showing on the opposite side. While still legible, it looks like quite a mess with that much show-through. Pencils and waterproof gels (Uni Signo) were better-behaved.
I actually rather like the detachable pages, since a significant fraction of the use I put a notebook to involves giving someone else information. Because of that, I typically stick to a Rhodia #12 or Maruman Mnemosyne, and I keep a half dozen note cards or loose Rhodia or Moleskine Cahier pages in each non-perforated notebok I carry around. It may be good to consider the Cahier a 48+16 notebook, rather than a 64 with reservations. I feel the notebook gains a bit of versatility when treated this way.
Christopher Keeble
on Monday, June 13th, 2011 at 12:54 pm
Nothing beats a Rhodia pad for my back pocket. Two fat staples keep it together and the plasticized cover keeps it from melting when my butt sweats in the Houston heat. Every page has a tight perforation that tears only when you want it to.
I’ve replaced my yellow legal pad with a larger Rhodia. Too often the yellow pads would be falling apart by the end of the month. Rhodia’s fat staples and tight perf. keep the pad together as long as I want.
Ira
on Thursday, June 16th, 2011 at 7:36 am
Do you use fountain pens on your notebooks? I do, and I’ve found that fp ink bleeds badly with every pocket notebook I have tried. Any suggestions?
Chiot's Run
on Friday, June 17th, 2011 at 5:03 pm
Came to you via the Field Notes website – they had me at made in the USA.
I’m a huge fan of the new Sharpie pens for writing, although I’m thinking of trying to find pencils made in the USA – wonder if that can happen?
Great review!
Karim D. Ghantous
on Saturday, June 18th, 2011 at 2:23 am
I enjoyed reading this so thanks! I have a problem with handwriting referred to as ‘analogue’, however. It makes no sense.
I pretty much do agree with your arguments. And even though I haven’t used Moleskines I don’t feel compelled to try. But that’s based on your review – someone else might give me reason to think otherwise.
One of the best points about Field Notes is that they’re not just nice to look at, but also fun to buy. The limited editions make it even more enjoyable. I started buying not long after their seasonal editions began and I have a nice, small collection. My favourite so far is the black Halloween version.
I have no problem with certain things being made in China. My Power Mac G5 is superbly made (thanks to Apple’s high standards and the Chinese manufacturer’s ability to take those standards seriously). However, what would be the point in something like Field Notes if they are not made in the country in which they originated?
Target and Kmart are justified in making clothes in China – but Calvin Klein is not. If I wanted cheap notepaper I wouldn’t buy a Chinese made notebook, I’d cut up discarded printer paper and staple it together. It’s eco-friendly and cheaper than free.
Mind you, I would never buy an American car, so the country that we all love (and I’m not American, BTW) doesn’t always deliver the right package. But that’s okay.
My love for Field Notes « Lorenz Szabo
on Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011 at 11:45 am
[...] Here is a great review. [...]
CB
on Thursday, June 23rd, 2011 at 12:47 pm
I think the “Pertinent Coordinates” is merely a humorous version of the word “address.” Nothing vague about it in my opinion.
Notebooks « wdytms
on Monday, July 11th, 2011 at 8:15 am
[...] by always having a pen and a notebook in my pocket. I used to love Moleskine notebooks. Based on this review, I’m switching to Field [...]
Keith Van Norman
on Wednesday, July 20th, 2011 at 2:15 pm
I was a Moleskine man for many, many years. I bought a 3-pack of Field Notes on a whim and have not bought a Moleskine since. In fact, I’m sitting on one right now (48 pages breaks-in way easier). Draplin Design Co. is the best in the Pacific Northwest, hands down.
Critical Creig » Field Notes Books at Half Dome
on Saturday, July 23rd, 2011 at 4:25 pm
[...] for having a notebook I want my friends using, but for providing a dozen of them for us. It’s no secret I love these books, so it was a big treat for me, giving them away. Leave a [...]
The Competition
on Tuesday, July 26th, 2011 at 9:30 am
[...] Critical Creig [...]
Michael
on Friday, October 28th, 2011 at 6:03 am
I googled “field notes vs moleskine” hoping to find something glowing that would push me over the edge to order more Field Notes. I don’t know yet if this has caused that but I enjoyed the thoughtful review.
P.S. Thanks for supporting an Illinois business. We need it.
Gary
on Monday, October 31st, 2011 at 12:57 pm
I also did a field notes vs. moleskine review. I also sided with the field notes for a variety of reasons, but there are definite pluses and minuses on both sides. Cool to see another person’s perspective.
I listed the pocket on the moleskine as a big negative as well. I would rather not have the pocket than a useless pocket that falls apart and adds weight/thickness to the notebook.
http://garythegary.com/2011/02/03/a-review-field-notes-vs-moleskine/
Michael
on Sunday, February 5th, 2012 at 9:02 pm
I really enjoyed reading your comparison between these two notebooks. As an architectural designer I have used moleskins for years. However, I carry around the larger ones for sketches. As far as field notes; I love their idea, but feel they missed a great opportunity by wasting space on the covers with mostly worthless info. Therefore I decided to make my own Field Notes Notebooks. I even put the template up on my blog with instructions on how to make it with a free complete template. Plus it has useful information in it. Check it out give me your thoughts. http://www.fieldnotesformen.com/make-your-own-fields-notes-notebook/