Hogwarts Express Ticket – Notebook.

It’s the 1^st September and that means it’s the first day of term at Hogwarts and all the students are busy boarding the Hogwarts Express on Platform 9 ¾ for the journey to school. Everyone has their tickets for the train and this year I have a ticket; albeit mine has been transfigured into a notebook.

When I bought this notebook, I was not expecting a lot for my pennies all £5.78 of them, but I was seriously surprized; this is a stunning notebook. I bought it from Amazon and the picture on Amazon doesn’t do justice to the work that has gone into this; this time Pyramid really have outdone themselves with this time.

The front and rear covers are cream with black text, gold foil and a debossed design that replicates the tickets used in the movies; it is worth noting that the spine is also decorated with a gold foil design and the 9 ¾ logo. To top it all off all three edges of the notebook pages are gilded, it has a useful pen loop, marker ribbon and a good elastic closure. I’ve been testing the latter and it has held up well and shows no sign of failing which is a big plus.

If all that wasn’t enough this notebook really starts to shine when you open it up. The inside front cover and fly leaf has a two-page picture of the Hogwarts Express travelling over an arched bridge and when you open the rear cover you get a two-page picture of Hogwarts Castle at night. 

The rear cover also has a useful pocket and this is where you see how much thought has gone into the design of this notebook; the image of the castle continues from the flyleaf across the inner cover (inside the pocket) and the same section of the picture is printed on the pocket which has been carefully aligned to provide an undisrupted picture of the castle.

Ok, so this next bit is best guess and some of it is based upon information for a different Pyramid notebook because try as I might I am unable to find the specification that lists the number of pages and the gsm of the paper; no doubt once this is published I will find this information in abundance and if I do I’ll update this. 

So here we go. The pages are A5 in size and a very nice cream paper, the lines and the Platform 9 ¾ logo are printed in light grey with approximately 8mm line spacing. My best guess is that the paper is around 80-90gsm and the notebook has approximately two hundred and forty pages (one hundred and twenty sheets). It is book bound and each section is stitched which means regardless of where you open this notebook it lies very flat ensuring the full width of the pages is available for us. 

I ink tested the paper using a very generous helping of Diamine Oxford Blue for the swab test and a wet writing fountain pen for the text. There is a little show through and minimal bleed on the both the swab and pen tests but not enough to prevent the reverse side of a page being used. All in all, I would say that this notebook is suitable for fountain pens and most other writing instruments, with the obvious exception of the Sharpie marker pen.

Finally, I really do recommend this notebook; at the price I paid it is outstanding value and whether you are buying for yourself or someone else this notebook will not disappoint.

Disclaimer: This 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.