Pen Display Rack

Because the back ends are flat, I have been displaying some of my Retro 1951 pens on my desk by standing them in rows pointing up. Unfortunately, being in that position for a long period seems to cause the ink cartridges to fail. They also make kind of a spectacular mess if I bump the desk. Setting them all back up after cleaning is kind of tedious, too.

So, I have been thinking of making a pen display for quite awhile. I was originally thinking of something flat, but my design ideas were kind of boring. I wanted something that could have a little bit of Celtic art inlay flair. Eventually, I came up with an idea for a triangular box with little narrow shelves for the pens on one angled face. A few mental revisions later, I realized I only needed the frame. In retrospect, I am realizing this has some affinity with martial arts weapons racks.

I designed this in Inkscape, and prototyped it in cardboard to make sure it would work. The only real change for the wood version was rounding the front feet a little. This is cut from 6mm thick walnut. The padauk turned out to be a little thinner. So, there was a lot of sanding of the two inlaid cross pieces to get them flat on both the fronts and backs.

I did most of the sanding before assembly, then glued everything up with standard wood glue.

The tabs on the cross pieces don’t go quite all the way through the side pieces. I put little rectangles of walnut veneer into the slots to cover the ends of the tabs, then sanded those flat with the sides.

It got three coats of wipe-on poly finish with light sanding between coats and at the end.

Astoundingly, this only holds about half of my Retro 51 pens. There is a fair chance I will make a second one of these, perhaps out of different materials.