Customer Reviews

Calligraphy Masterclass: A Complete Guide with Ten Stylish Projects

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I can't say that's not a nice book: good examples and very nice works, a careful edition. But the subtitle Masterclass is not true. I bought expecting an advanced guide for my projects and what I found was beginer's lessons. But what really made me happy was the material (that was not even cited when I bought), very good pens,ink(for fountain pen, that's not included...) and a gold foil. The other problem is that there's almost any instructions about the material, especially the bamboo pen shaping.

This set is just terrible. The box has the lie that this set includes everything you need. In fact, it contains no calligraphy ink, and the ink that is in the box is packaged in fountain pen cartridges. That there is no fountain pen in the bos makes this fact is bizare. Moreover, the text book is useless.

BUY READER'S DIGEST'S "THE COMPLETE CALLIGRAPHY SET" INSTEAD. It is an excellent work, does have everything you need, and has much more information in the text book.

My wife received this as a Christms gift. We were both confused as to the mish-mash of materials and instructions provided, especially since on the cover it states "A Complete Guide to Calligraphy with Ten Stylish Projects" and on the back is assures the buyer that the kit comes with "everything you will need...." Not only is everything NOT included, the instructions themselves are sparse and very badly written. It reminds me of a Mad Magazine take on "how to draw comics" where the first few panels show blobs and the last a finished, highly detailed piece.

Other examples of bad writing: while a few pages show the angle to use from above, none show the elevation. Most amazingly, in several places and projects, the author shows a few letters from the example stylized scripts, she doesn't show the entire alphabet.

I was rather excited to have received this calligraphy set for Christmas but was surprised to find that I could not use it immediately. The book comes with a nice inking pen, but no pot of ink. It does come with ink cartridges but no fountain pen. It's ridiculous. The book is pretty to look at but as the other reviewer mentioned, little instruction is given on the art of calligraphy.
The missing pieces of material is quite disappointing. I was really looking forward to trying my new calligraphy set.
Not a good way to please your customers.

Well thank goodness. I am happy to learn from the other reviews that I am NOT a moron, the tools really DON'T go together, the instructions really ARE incomplete, and you really DO have to buy some extra things to actually use this.

As others have mentioned: you get some cool nibs and pen holder ... but these together will create a dip pen - and you don't get any ink to dip it in. Then you get 4 ink cartridges, which are made for fountain pens -- but you don't get a fountain pen at all!

I've had this kit for probably 5 years, but never had the patience to figure out why I was so confused by the tools and instructions. Well, now I am determined to use these, because the nibs really ARE cool, and I finally bought some dip ink. But to tell you the truth, I still don't quite understand how to assemble the pen/reservoir/nib combination, as the instructions don't really explain it. And I'm not a beginner, it's just that I've always used calligraphy fountain pens.

As far as the book part goes, the first half offers beginners' instructions on some various writing styles. The second half offers ideas for turning calligraphy into art. So definitely don't get this for a true beginner unless you supply a set of calligraphy fountain pens and a bottle of ink along with it.