{"product_id":"yamamoto-paper-canopus-note-a5-ga104","title":"Yamamoto Paper Canopus Note — A5 Notebook","description":"\u003ch4 dir=\"ltr\"\u003eTwo years of paper development spent replacing one discontinued sheet\u003c\/h4\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eWhen Cosmo Air Light — the paper behind Yamamoto's earlier Cosmo Note, a favorite among fountain pen users for its ink shading and sheening — went out of production in 2022, the company didn't try to find a substitute. They set out to beat what they'd lost. Canopus, the paper developed for this notebook, is the result of roughly two years of trial and error, built specifically to go beyond what Cosmo Air Light could do rather than simply replicate it. The effort was recognized before most customers had even opened one: Canopus Note won the JetPens \"Writer's Choice\" Award at the Tokyo Stationery Award 2025, voted on by stationery retailers and industry professionals rather than the manufacturer itself.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch5 dir=\"ltr\"\u003eWhat \"going beyond\" actually means on the page\u003c\/h5\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eFountain pen ink shows its character in specific ways — shading, where tone varies across a stroke; sheening, where a metallic cast appears at the edges of pooled ink; and shimmer, where actual particles catch the light. Getting paper to display all three well is harder than it sounds, since the same absorption properties that create rich shading can flatten sheen, and vice versa. Canopus paper is built to let all three effects surface clearly, with a soft, almost silky surface that lets a nib glide rather than drag.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch5 dir=\"ltr\"\u003eWhere it specifically improves on Cosmo Air Light\u003c\/h5\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eThe comparison isn't just marketing — reviewers who tested both papers side by side point to two concrete fixes. Cosmo Air Light had a noticeably spongy feel underhand, and it let fine nibs lay down lines closer to what a medium nib would produce, which made line width harder to predict. Canopus is firmer to write on, with the kind of light feedback people generally want from good paper, and it keeps line widths consistent with what a given nib is supposed to produce. One reviewer put it plainly: Cosmo Air Light was never something he wanted to commit to for a full 200-page journal, while Canopus is paper he's comfortable filling front to back — which is precisely the use case this notebook, at 176 pages, is built for.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch5 dir=\"ltr\"\u003e176 pages, and nothing printed on them\u003c\/h5\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eEvery page is blank. Instead of a fixed ruling, the notebook includes a removable guide sheet offering both a 12mm ruled option and a 6mm grid, slid underneath a page as a visible-through reference rather than printed permanently onto the paper — useful if you switch between ruled writing and gridded layouts depending on what you're working on, or if you just prefer keeping the option open.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch5 dir=\"ltr\"\u003eBuilt to actually hold together\u003c\/h5\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eAt 176 pages, this is a substantially thicker notebook than most of Yamamoto's other lines, so it's bound with thread stitching designed to keep that volume of pages secure through repeated use rather than loosening at the spine over time.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDetails\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cul dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\n\u003cli\u003ePaper: Canopus (Yamamoto's proprietary formulation), approx. 73g\/m²\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSize: A5, 148 × 210mm\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003ePages: 176, plain (blank)\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eProduct code: GA104\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eAccessory: removable writing guide sheet (12mm ruled \/ 6mm grid)\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eBinding: thread-bound\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eRecognition: JetPens \"Writer's Choice\" Award, Tokyo Stationery Award 2025\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eMade in Japan\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBilingual service — English and French\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Yamamoto Paper","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50586937327841,"sku":"YP-GA104","price":39.99,"currency_code":"CAD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0806\/8032\/1249\/files\/13833142_3.jpg?v=1790449208","url":"https:\/\/shosai.ca\/products\/yamamoto-paper-canopus-note-a5-ga104","provider":"Shosai","version":"1.0","type":"link"}