HOUSE OF GRAPHITE

The Tombow MONO Calligraphy Pencil (model KM-KKS) is a hexagonal wood-cased pencil made for "kohitsu shosha" — Japanese handwriting and calligraphy practice — and is sold in two soft grades, 4B and 6B. It has an unusually wide 3 mm high-density, ultrafine-particle graphite core that lays down dark, smooth lines without heavy pressure and lets the writer vary stroke weight to form the tome, hane and harai (stops, hooks and sweeps) of brush-style characters; the barrel ends in a plain plug rather than an eraser. Tombow Pencil Co. (founded in Japan in 1913) currently manufactures the line in Vietnam. This specimen: MONO Calligraphy / Penmanship in grade 6B.

4B