Pen World v32.6

“I drive our craftsmen crazy in our workshop; each new creation is an attempt to
redefine our craft, and the Milles collection is no exception. As beautiful as the Henrik
Wigstrom, Winter, and Crystal collection pieces still are, I believe a transformation can
be seen from our earlier work to these newer concepts—not only in design, but in
the level of difficulty required to actually produce them,” Oscarson says.
The Milles fountain pen collection dissolves the delineation between form and
function. That is, the thematic associations found in the piece are not just metaphorically
but physically manifested in the creation, as this fountain pen is the first to blend
two colors of hot enamel over the total surface of the pen without separating them
with silver outlines. In this delicate and difficult procedure, Oscarson actively battles the
fact that, ordinarily, the metal oxides employed to achieve an array of colors each
require particular temperatures for firing.
Oscarson says, “In this instance, we are intentionally blending two colors together
to re-create the merging of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers here in St. Louis, just as
it was interpreted in Milles’s fountain.”
Above—the David Oscarson Raoul Walleberg collection
premiered in 2018 and is limited to 100 editions with either a
blue barrel with silver cap (uncapped) or a blue barrel and cap;
the Sankta Lucia fountain pen commemorates St. Lucia and the
annual Christmas-time Sankta Lucia celebration in Sweden.
Left—Carl Linnaeus fountain pen with red enamel cap and gold
barrel; Alfred Nobel fountain pen with black enamel cap and
white barrel.
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