Expecto Patronum – The Dingbats A6+ Notebook

I was in the mood to try out a pocket sized, albeit a generous pocket, notebook that would easily adapt to landscape or portrait use and after a short wander around Amazon I came across the Dingbats A6+ Notebook which seemed to me to be big enough to be useful but still within the remit of pocket sized.

This ‘reporter’ style notebooks is from Dingbats signature collection (Dingbats A6+ Notebook) and so you will find a range of colours and animals and being a bit of a Harry Potter fan I opted for the notebook with the stag (Harry’s Patronus) debossed upon it, I only wish it was available in Gryffindor red rather than a just deep green.

So, this notebook, like the Dingbats ones I have reviewed before, is a hard cover notebook covered in vegan PU synthetic leather. Debossed on the front you will find the stag and on the rear you will find the Dignbats name; and it is also worth noting that the edges are very neatly stitched, rather than relying solely on glue, which helps to remind you how much thought has gone into the build quality of this notebook.

It has a good strong durable elastic closure and unlike many other notebooks this has not failed me despite rigorous testing by over stretching it when stuffing additional papers into the notebook.

As with all Dingbats notebooks you will find the inner lining paper (and end papers) printed with the footprints of your chosen animal and at the front of the notebook is a panel for you to insert ownership details and as part of the rear cover there is a pocket.

Moving on, the paper used by Dingbats is FSC certified acid free and is 100gsm cream silk paper that is said to be fountain pen friendly. I tested this claim with Diamine Oxford Blue and I can confirm that this is the case; yes there is a little show through but not enough to prevent you from using the reverse side of a page. Please remember when I ink test I go heavy with a strong colour so in normal use you may not even see any show through.

In use the notebook opens sufficiently flat to allow full use of the pages and each page is micro perforated and this latter feature is not great; you have to fold it crease it and then tear it. 

To be fair this was a point that came up in an earlier review and Mo from Dingbats said it was being addressed; but because I chose to order my notebook came from Amazon it could very easily have been older stock.

I’ve used this notebook in both orientations and found it easy to use and being just that bit bigger than A6 makes it just the right size to be useful, to give this some context the pages are roughly the same size as 6”x4” index cards.

A final point to make is that this notebook is very durable; it has been travelling with me for a while now and it still looks as good as new which is a reflection of both the build quality and how useful it has turned out to be.

So, do I think it’s worth your pennies?

Yes, it’s an excellent quality notebook and an ideal size for everyday use and if you’re a Harry Potter fan it has the added bonus of having Harry’s Patronus debossed on the cover. Another one is on my shopping list and will make it straight to the top if Dingbats ever decide to make a nice deep red version aka Gryffindor ‘inspired’ red I will be ordering a lot of them.

Disclaimer: The notebook was purchased with my own funds at retail price. The opinions expressed in this review are my own; and I am not connected with either the retailers or manufacturers in any way.