ASC Arco Gladiatore Medio: A Review

“All money is a matter of belief.”

-Adam Smith

“Ultimately, it is the desire, not the desired, that we love.”

-Friedrich Nietzsche

When I first saw Arco Bronze celluloid I didn’t like it very much. At the time, brown pens weren’t really my style and the price tag was more than enough to keep me away. After OMAS went under and the Arco Bronze became the stuff of legends, I started to see it around all the time, OMAS pens going for thousands of dollars. It became a pen that you had to have to complete your collection, one urushi, one Pilot Myu, one Sailor Cross Point, and of course one Arco Bronze. I saw it around for years and it grew on me and grew on me until about a month ago when I decided to buy it.

The Collapse of OMAS

You can’t understand why a Arco pen is so expensive without first understanding some of the history of the material. OMAS was an Italian luxury manufacturer started in 1925 by Armando Simone (who’s initials form ASC) and was known for its use of celluloid pens. Celluloid is known for a few reasons, namely how beautiful some of the patterns are, and how volatile the material is. Celluloid is a fairly unstable and flammable material, which is part of the reason that environmental law now prohibits its manufacture. Adding to this was the bankruptcy of OMAS in 2016, both of these facts insuring that no one would make Arco celluloid again.

To call it ironic, that on the eve of OMAS’s collapse their pens would become some of the most sought after in the world, would be an understatement. A brand that I didn’t really consider worth looking at was now getting unreasonable prices on eBay. But why? It wasn’t like they suddenly got better or they were found to have some special properties. I say this not to sound trite as if I’m asking a rhetorical question, I mean it. Why did this pen, this material, suddenly rise in price? People will often talk about scarcity economics and “the market”, but we are the market, people are the market. The real question I want to get at is, why do we do this?

Limited Editions

Limited editions in their modern incarnation are the strangest mix of branding and market incentives. Almost all of the limited edition pens are regularly scheduled. Sailor and LAMY are both prolific when it comes to the non-limited limited edition. Every year (and often more frequently than that) each of them release many limited editions that are actually fairly similar, the same models and different colors. Some of them are actually quite popular, sold out instantly and are now up to 4 times retail price.

One of my favorite limited editions, the rose gold TWSBI Eco

So why don’t they find one that sold out really quickly and continue to make it? It’d be like printing money right? I think the reason is that if they made these in unlimited quantities people wouldn’t buy them. If there were unlimited Arco Bronze in the world then people just wouldn’t be that interested in buying them and certainly I wouldn’t have bought mine either. And that’s what I find disappointing and leaves me somewhat disheartened.

I understand that there was now a finite limit on the amount of Arco in the world and that this fact alone would make anything rise in price, I just want to interrogate that assumption. Its not a law of nature that scarcity increases value, its something we, as people, do. Scarcity economics seems to be to be wholly unimaginative and ineffectual at actually judging value. I can think of a great deal of things that are more valuable than an Arco pen, in real terms, that are not accurately evaluated by scarcity economics.

What I don’t want is anyone to come out of this with a negative opinion of limited editions or the cool pen they just bought. What I don’t like it how easy it is to manipulate me and what I want and how it can feel like these pens are actually that valuable, as valuable as a months rent or 100 hours of work.

Not having the Pen:

As far as having the Gladiatore Medio goes I think it will be different for everyone. The look of the material and the firmness of the nib were both positives for me, although I had to do some tuning to get the Gladiatore to write how I wanted. But the experience of not having the pen was one of the best parts.

Picture of the ebonite feed

Maybe I’m the only one, but one of the most enjoyable parts about buying a fountain pen online is the wait. That excruciating wait where all I can think of is getting to that day where I’ll get the pen in the mail. Almost always that’s the best feeling, it’s better than actually having the pen. That $1000 pen in your head is worth every penny, the real one has problems. It’s just a pen, it writes admirably, shines winningly, but that’s about it. Overhyped, overvalued, these words could be used to describe an Arco pen but that would really lose the flavor of what is going on here.

What it amounts to is the feeling of knowing that someone else out there would like the pen that you have right there in front of you. That’s why its so expensive, so you can have that feeling. I’m pretty sure that I don’t feel like this is worth it, or at least I wouldn’t like myself very much if I did.

Every Problem’s a Nail:

When the only tool you have is a hammer every problem looks like a nail. When you only have one metric for judging value, everything has a price. I don’t want to get into arguments about efficiency or practicality; I just wish there were other metrics for judging something, other ways of being and feeling valuable than dollar amounts.

It feels like money isn’t just a way to assign something value but a way for value to be seen. What I mean by this is that high salaries and high prices are seen as value expressed rather than the other way around. Since we only have one method of measurement it becomes not only predictable but rational to see that method as the only true way of being successful and valuable.

That’s what it feels like to own a ASC Gladiatore Medio in Arco Bronze. It feels like the unease from knowing that we’ve got it wrong on some fundamental level, that this pen, like everything else, is just a nail.

To Think About it or To Not Think About it:

So what you might be thinking right about now is: what a depressing way to look at a beautiful pen. And I agree, it is a wonderful thing, so it begs the question. Should I really think about the uneasiness? Or should I just accept that I can’t change it and move on? I don’t have answers to that question. I don’t know if its better to ignore something like this or if thinking about it is really useful and I’m not sure if anyone does, but as far as I can tell not knowing is important.

This review might not have been what you were expecting, but I hope that it was helpful.

-Minabeko