Kaweco Liliput fountain pen review

The Kaweco Liliput is a very small metal-barrelled pen. It comes in a variety of finishes and with nibs from extra-fine to extra-broad. This version costs a little over £60 in the UK and a little over $80 in the USA.

I doubt it’s possible to make a pen much smaller than this without making it unusable. There is just enough space inside the barrel for a short international sized cartridge. The rest of the pen is simply the section and a cap.

The Kaweco Liliput is a simple brass tube with a nib in it and I love it for that simplicity.

The nib is a standard Kaweco one and so swappable with most of the range. The extra-fine nib in this pen is fantastic. It’s smooth and quite fine by German-nib standards. Kaweco’s finer nibs, on the whole, are their best.

The cap screws off the section end of the barrel and onto the very end to form a pen of a decent length. In my big hands there’s no denying it’s small but it’s big enough to use for a reasonable amount of time without discomfort. I find it a lot more comfortable than the Pilot Petite, for example. The only problem I have is that it’s impossible to for me to use it unposted and the cap takes a lot of turns to take off and post. Unlike the Kaweco Sport range, this injects a delay into taking a quick note.

I like things to be what they are and there is something that is very honest about this pen. It is all about being a tube with a nib. The brass develops a beautiful patina very quickly and just looks fantastic. It’s perfect for knocking about in a pocket: it’s small and any knocks or scratches just add to its charm.

Have you noticed that I like this pen rather a lot? It’s got simplicity and charm, and it writes wonderfully.

You can find some more reviews of the Kaweco Liliput on Pennaquod.