Reform LUXUS Original Never Used Amazing Art Deco 1930s Chevron "Tiger Eye" Jade Green Celluloid w/14K Super Flex Nib Fountain Pen from the "Attic Find"

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Original Never Used Amazing Art Deco 1930s Reform LUXUS Chevron "Tiger Eye" Jade Green Celluloid w/14K Super Flex Nib Fountain Pen from the "Attic Find" Item ID: REF-076

Original Never Used Amazing Art Deco 1930s Reform LUXUS Chevron "Tiger Eye" Jade Green Celluloid w/14K Super Flex Nib Fountain Pen from the "Attic Find"

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$676.99

Details

Reform Luxus - Jade Green Chevron

Manufacturer/Model: Reform Germany/Luxus EF Chevron Jade Green
Year of production:  Exact year unknown, estimated mid to late 1930s
Filling system: Piston filling (Original cork replaced with x4 HQ rubber O-rings - silicone greased)
Nib: 14K 585 - EF Extra Extra Fine - Super Flex melts on paper, writes up to BB/3B, super wet and consistent; Original Ebonite feed
Material: Cap & Barrel - celluloid. Turning Knob Cap & Grip section polished Ebonite/Hard Rubber. Piston parts metal. Cast and Gold Filled clip and rings
Length (pen closed): 131mm, Posted: Oversized 167mm posed; Diameter at cap 13.3mm; Diameter at barrel ink window 11.2mm
Condition and information:

*Date first published & listed: March 12th 2023
*This is the first Reform pen from this group/type of this find to be listed.

Context & Provenance:
To read more about the circumstances about how and where this pen was found, please visit our blog page here.
Article: "June 2nd 2021 - The 80 Year Lost, 300+ Pen Attic Find"
This find was also covered in an article by The Pelikan's Perch. You can read the article here: "Treasures In The Attic: A Time Capsule Rediscovered"


Reform Luxus 1930s

When this pen was made, Reform was what Apple was in the 1980, a rebel company, with bold goals, no compromises, one drive only, make the best pens ever made! Several engineers from the then well established pen companies, after their bold ideas and passion wouldn't be heard at "IBM", left and founded Reform. This was the result. 

No matter how many pens we have worked on in the last couple of decades, sometimes, seemingly out of nowhere, a pen appears that simply takes our breath away. This is one of those pens. Having seen pretty much most of what was ever made, either worked on them, saw and felt on pen shows, there are still some pens that even for us, are just breaking the ordinary and making our days at the office more exciting.
 
We couldn't even start to imagine how this amazing deep colorful celluloid chevron pattern was made, we know it must had been made from a laminated pieces of celluloid, similar to a technique widely used at the time, but this is a completely different level as opposed to the tortoise striped versions or sleeved versions as on the Pelikans 100/100N. It is like working in 2D but thinking about finishing the product in 3D. However, despite that, we have seen this chevron pattern before, what is commonly referred to as "Tiger Eye'', by Montblanc. You can see an example here in the Model 334&1/2. However, having handled that pen and examined it so carefully inside and out, we could just not shake the feeling these two pens were made by the same people, the patterns, the angles, the shades, and separations, they seem to us too similar to have come from two different places. You can also see another example of this Montblanc "Tiger Eye" chevron pattern here: https://www.vintagemontblancpens.com/spanish-chevron-designs
 
This begs the question, were these pens made by Reform or by Montblnac or indeed made separately-independently. Somehow our gut feeling tells us these late 1930s Tiger Eye chevrons were all actually made by Reform and sold to other companies. We might be wrong, but for us there are hints, both in manufacturing details we can see, but also in historical facts and circumstances we are aware of, and we know companies collaborated a lot at this time.
 
Nonetheless we fell in love with this pen so much that we took exactly 285 photos of it; what you see is just ~50 or so from that photoshoot. At this point it's probably pointless to talk about it's details, the photos say it best, but here are some things to point out why this pen was the Macintosh of it's time:
  • - Thick amber and jade green celluloid chevron pattern - entire body and cap made our of chevron Tiger Eye pattern - carefully laminated sheets and later turned/rolled into a barrel and cap shape. Transparent, vivid colors, unmatched quality, no deformations, very strong build
  • - The cork is at least 2 times longer than any found on pistons at that time. This means a much better seal was made but also meant more resistance while the piston head is moving up & down in the chamber, which means more stress on the turning knob and spiral. This is why we had to place 4 o-rings on the slot to replace the cork, instead of the usual 2 o-rings as we do with Pelikans 100/100N, or Montblancs from this era.
  • - The more stress/force on the spiral and turning knob, means it's probably not a good idea for it to be made by ebonite as its will break, as it was on almost all of the pens from the era. So here we go, Reform made it out of what it seems to us to be a magnesium, first we have ever seen. However it also seems the spiral was cast and not turned on a lathe, as there are a couple of "witness marks" on both ends of the spiral. It is difficult to imagine that someone could make a precise enough mold to cast a metal spiral in the 1930s.
  • - Since now the cork is so long, and has an increased resistance from the surface area with the chamber, it eliminates the need for a piston shaft with a pin in order to prevent the piston rod from turning around its axis. And as we all know - "the best part is no part" - E.M.
  • - This however means a strong connecting part is needed between the turning knob, the piston rod and the barrel - so here again, unlike anyone at the time, this part here is a metal brass as opposed to ebonite.
  • - The clip is a masterpiece on its own. When others were struggling to make this part, Reform seems to have cast it flawlessly, and later inlaid their amazingly beautiful logo with enamel. However the true achievement is that the clip is one piece, including a crown, and a screw which screws it onto the body. This was probably the hardest and most complicated way to make a clip-crown-screw then in one piece, as opposed to almost everything we see from the era, a pressed clip, bent with an O-opening, placed over a threaded cap end, and finished with a cap-top piece. What was that saying again - "no part is the best part".
  • - Not 1, not 2, but 3 masterfully executed, gentle, elegant, ring inserts around the cap to prevent any cracks. One of the hardest processes in cap band making
  • - Besides Kaweco, probably one of the first to implement a capped turning knob in order to prevent accidental turns and ink leakage.
 
And now for the star of the show, the masterpiece nib, since any words won't do it justice, and as you and us know, it's more about the "feel", let's just say, this is not a nib, rather it is a gentle, smooth, paint brush. It is marked "EF" on the turning knob, but it will perform EF only when it gives the paper the gentlest kiss! Any pressure after that is a true line-art! 
 
Reform always made some of the best nibs we have ever used, and most of us here use Reform pens ourselves. There is no era in the ~6 decades of Reform existence that they haven't made marvelous nibs, up until the end in the late 1980s. And now with this pen, we can see how they started. It is suspended over a very nice, elegantly designed and sloped feed, (we can even recognize an Art Deco design to it), which one could argue, the whole pen is designed in that spirit, but also the feed is polished ebonite not raw as we are used seeing, with a large ink canal to feed this very ink-happy nib.
 
This pen together with several other Reform pens, was found in the "Attic Find" together with over 300 other pens, which if you haven't read it by now, you can read all about it in our Blog here: https://www.protopens.com/blog
Article: June 2nd 2021 - The 80 Year Lost, 300+ Pen Attic Find
 
This was amazing - lifetime privilege - for us to be part of this Attic Find. It was also featured in an article at The Pelikan's Perch: https://thepelikansperch.com/2021/09/13/pelikan-attic-find-north-macedonia/
 
This pen together with the other Reforms in this find, about a dozen or so, was probably made in the late 1930, or possibly very early 1940. This pen has a sibling, nearly identical, but in Blue Chevron, which will be listed in the following weeks. Fortunately for us all, only several of the brands from this find had 14K gold nibs, among which most of the Reform pens, as opposed to nearly all Pelikans who had CN nibs. The pen is not restored, except for the change of cork with o-rings so we can make it fully functional, and had been only brought back to life, lovingly refreshed, cleaned, serviced and praised and admired along each step. As you can probably tell, we are not just about selling pens... with these old pens, which we consider works of art, we also see most of what we do on them as work of art, so we like to take our time with each and every pen, even if it takes weeks-months or sometimes even years until we are ready to work on any of them.
Warranty

This item is covered by our 1 Year Full International Warranty at no additional cost. The terms of our Warranty are very simple, meant to give you a secure and trouble-free buying experience.

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This item is located in Europe and ships Worldwide.

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