The Compatible Inks & Refills field is a multichoice that makes a very specific technical distinction: proprietary ink cartridges, standard international short cartridges, proprietary ink converter, and bottled inks. That distinction is what separates a thoughtful collection database from a pen list. A pen that only accepts proprietary cartridges is a different proposition from one that takes international shorts or can be converted to bottled ink via a piston converter. Before you pay import prices for a bottle of Pilot Iroshizuku Tsukushi or Robert Oster Signature, you need to know whether the pen you're pairing it with can actually accept bottled ink.
When a Collection Outgrows Your Memory
A fountain pen collection grows laterally across brands, nib sizes, filling systems, and body materials in ways that are genuinely hard to track without structure. You remember your Pelikan M800 has an 18k gold broad nib and piston filling, but you forget which Lamy pens are cartridge-only and which came with a converter. You know you have a demonstrator somewhere but can't remember if it's the TWSBI Eco or the Pilot Metropolitan — and that matters when you're eyedropper-converting because only the Eco has the thread tolerance to hold a silicone-sealed eyedropper fill reliably.
The Demonstrator boolean is a single field, but it immediately sorts your pens into opaque and see-through bodies. Demonstrators are the eyedropper candidates in a collection, because the transparent barrel lets you monitor ink level without removing the cap and disturbs the seal less frequently. If you're buying a demonstrator secondhand and want to know whether the ink window will show residual staining, the About field is where that history gets recorded.
The Status field carries two values: Searching and Current. Searching is the wishlist state — a pen you've decided to acquire, perhaps one you've placed on a secondary market alert. Current means it's in the collection. The simplicity is deliberate: this catalog doesn't need a "sold" or "traded" state because the model is a stable personal collection, not inventory management.
Three Nib Fields That Prevent Costly Surprises
Nib Size, Nib Color, and Nib Material are three independent fields, and all three matter at the point of purchase or resale.
Nib size runs from UEF (ultra extra fine) through EF, F, SM (soft medium), M, B, and specialty grinds — 1.1mm and 1.5mm stubs, flex, flex-music, and music. The H-F (hard fine) option reflects the vintage pen vocabulary where nib designations didn't always map to modern size conventions. If you're filling out a record for a pre-war pen acquired at a pen show, H-F is the accurate designation.
Nib material — steel, stainless steel, rhodium-plated, 14k gold, 18k gold, and 21k gold — determines both the writing experience and the resale value. A steel nib and an 18k nib on the same pen body represent a significant price difference on the secondary market. A rhodium-plated nib can look silver but is steel underneath; that matters when someone asks about the gold content before buying.
Nib color — silver, gold, gold 14k, gold 14k two-tone, gold 18k, rose gold, black — captures the visual specification that buyers ask about in listings. A rhodium-plated steel nib typically presents as silver. A two-tone 14k nib has gold trim against a silver body. These distinctions belong in a searchable field, not a free-text note.
The Ink Record That Pairs with Each Pen
Each pen record in this template also carries embedded ink metadata: Ink Brand, Ink Name, Ink Color, Year Bought, Ink Source, and Ink Price. This isn't a separate linked library — it's a co-located record that captures the ink currently paired with the pen or the ink most recently run through it.
The Pen Source and Ink Source fields record where each item was acquired — a specific pen shop, an online retailer, a pen show, a private sale. For provenance questions or warranty claims, the source field is the first lookup. The Pen Year and Year Bought fields anchor each item in the timeline of your collection: a 2019 Pilot Custom 823 bought at a pen show in Manila is a different record than a 2023 one bought from a local shop.
Pen Price and Ink Price are in PHP, reflecting the collection's home market — a useful reminder that price context matters. A PHP 8,500 pen is not the same as an $8,500 pen.