Montblanc History
Montblanc – the world’s first address for high-quality writing instruments and travel accessories
Mobility and travel as a breeding ground for the “safety” fountain pen
Groundbreaking technical developments shaped the zeitgeist of the early 20th century. 
With the revolutionary invention of the automobile, individual mobility became an integral part of the lives of growing sections of the population overnight and acted as an accelerator for ideas that had previously only been slumbering in drawers.
One of these developments for which the topic of travel had such a catalytic effect is the fountain pen. People had already written with a pen and ink before, but now there was a need for a writing instrument that could be used anywhere, regardless of an inkwell, because it always carried the ink supply safely with it, preventing it from running out. The latter was also clearly highlighted in advertising in the early years of the fountain pen, with visuals on advertisements highlighting how writing and travel go together perfectly thanks to the so-called safety fountain pen. "With a Rouge et Noir fountain pen, you won't make any smudges" was the copy on one of these advertisements.
Speaking of travel: travel companions in the form of fine leather products can be found in the Montblanc range from the mid-1930s to the present day – the spectrum ranges from wallets, organizers, belts, briefcases to travel trolleys.
The fountain pen – from the new to the old and back to the whole world
Montblanc in Hamburg can claim to have helped the fountain pen to achieve its global breakthrough. Two of the three company founders, however, had previously sought inspiration and models for perfecting this development abroad, particularly in the "New World" and in England, where they had come into contact with the fountain pen technology, which was still in its infancy, and were enthusiastic about it.
In 1906, the engineer August Eberstein and the businessman Alfred Nehemias founded a small workshop in Berlin to produce fountain pens. Sales were international from the start. The nucleus for Montblanc was created.
The duo soon met CJ Voß, described as a banker in some treatises on Montblanc's history. Today it would be more apt to call him a business angel or venture capitalist, because CJ Voß was an investor and mentor looking for promising products and he saw the fountain pen as one such product. He recognized that the Berlin "start-up" needed a more professional framework to be successful. It was he who then raised the necessary capital so that the SIMPLO Filler Pen Co. and later Montblanc-Simplo GmbH could be founded in Hamburg in 1907.
Hamburg is often referred to as the gateway to the world, and this was certainly true for Montblanc, as the brand expanded as early as 1909/10 and established sales offices in Paris, London and Barcelona, subsequently conquering the entire world - only temporarily interrupted in times of war.
The most iconic writing instrument of all time, the Meisterstück, was introduced in 1924. The Meisterstück is on display in the Museum of Modern Art in New York. This fountain pen was often referred to as the Power Pen in recognition of the many contracts that were signed internationally with it.
The white star and the number 4810 – symbols of the global brand Montblanc
How does a Hamburg company come to make a mountain peak in the French Alps its brand name? They wanted to signal that the demands on the product quality of the writing instruments produced are extremely high and therefore used a high mountain as a reference. The Zugspitze would therefore be on the At first glance, it was also a possible name for the pen. But neither phonetically nor in terms of height could it keep up with the Montblanc and would have given the company, which was internationally oriented from the start, a provincial touch. Moreover, at the beginning of the 20th century, it was considered in better circles as It is an expression of sophistication to be able to speak French, preferably in a mixture with one's own mother tongue.
Alongside the word mark, the Montblanc logo was created, albeit a little later. While the first devices from the Rouge et Noir series made of black hard rubber had a red cap top, the brand symbol that is still used today, the white Montblanc star, became the standard from 1914 onwards. This only appears to be the image of a star - it is intended to symbolise the snow-covered peak of Montblanc, from which 6 valleys branch off in all directions. With its rather soft lines, not like a star that is usually depicted as sharp-pointed, the brand symbol balances out the rather masculine, strict typo of the Montblanc word mark. In any case, the Montblanc "star" has developed into one of the world's most well-known brand symbols.
Another reminiscence of the Montblanc can be found in many Montblanc products today: the number 4810. It stands for the height of the Montblanc, measured at the beginning of the last century and recorded in atlases, and has been embossed on many nibs of Montblanc fountain pens since 1930, particularly those from the Meisterstück series. It is also used as a limitation number for the annually reissued limited edition Patron of The Arts.
Montblanc brand image – handwriting as a value in itself
A qualitatively perfect product alone does not explain the fascination of a brand. A flawless product in every respect 
Product quality in terms of design, workmanship and durability is a matter of course for a luxury brand, but it is never the sole reason for purchase. When people choose a Montblanc product, they ultimately do so because of the brand and its appeal.
Writing as a cultural technique is one of the outstanding achievements in human history. The ability to write and read is essential for the development and cohesion of societies, as it is the prerequisite for any form of education. From this perspective, the tools used to write are "system-relevant".
In the age of the Internet, handwriting has lost its importance for mass communication, but the triumph of the fountain pen in the 1980s and 1990s was not despite the Internet, but because of it. In the age of digitalization, a handwritten note has a greater impact on the recipient than ever before, as it stands out from the flood of daily emails. Handwriting sends a message - that the recipient means something to the sender because they took the time to write something down, perhaps even in a script that "speaks" in the uniqueness that characterizes every person. This applies not only to love letters, but also to business life.
Neurologists have repeatedly scientifically proven that people approach a problem more concentratedly, precisely and effectively when they structure their thoughts on a piece of paper using a writing instrument.
Taking the time to express feelings and writing a handwritten statement means giving something, an event or a person a very special meaning. At the same time, it documents personal style, culture and the desire for lasting values. Writing a letter means being able to distinguish what is important from what is unimportant. Just as we give free rein to our feelings in crucial situations, the ink flows onto the paper and shows the emotions of the writer.
Thoughts, ideas and creativity are manifested in writing - it is an expression of personality and education and is part of a person's style. In this sense, Montblanc products are tools to make one's own personality visible. They are a statement that distinguishes and sets the people who use Montblanc products apart as educated, cultured people with high standards for themselves.
Finally, Montblanc's image includes its luxury character, although luxury here has nothing to do with being obscenely expensive, bling-bling or show-off - quite the opposite. Montblanc products have been meeting sustainability requirements since before this was a criterion. They are designed to be passed on from one generation to the next and never lose their value, but are an inexhaustible source of memories for other people.
Montblanc and culture
A brand image is and remains strong only if it is continually filled with life. Montblanc has "committed" itself to culture and has repeatedly and credibly underlined this over the years by initiating and supporting corresponding activities. Examples without claiming to be complete include:
- The long-term sponsorship of the Young Directors Project as part of the annual Salzburg Festival.
- The Montblanc de La Culture Arts Patronage Award, which has been presented annually since 1992 in 17 countries to honour personalities who have made a contribution to art and culture – the award winners each received €15,000 and a fountain pen from the Patron Of The Arts collection, which is released annually for this occasion.
- The Young Artist World Patronage, which gave visual artists a global stage through boutique window dressing
- The Women's World Award, which honored women who have made a positive change in the world
- Cooperation with the Entertainment Industry Foundation in the USA to give disadvantaged young people access to their own performance or the John Lennon Tour Bus through Europe with similar intention and success
- Several collaborations with Unicef to support literacy campaigns
The list of outstanding personalities who have supported Montblanc in this way or acted as brand ambassadors is correspondingly long: from Katherine Jenkins to Lang Lang, from Julianne Moore to Johnny Depp and Nicolas Cage, from Veronica Ferres to Günter Jauch, from Hugh Jackman to Joshua Bell, from Peter Maffay to Justus Frantz, from Catherine Deneuve to Reinhold Messner, from Gudrun Landgrebe to Wladimir Klitschko. The list of prominent users and supporters is endless. Just take a close look when politicians sign contracts on television.
Products
What all Montblanc products have in common is that they are designed to be life companions, products that you use for a long time, in extreme cases for a lifetime. You never own a Montblanc product alone; you keep it for the next generation. Above all, in times that seem to be moving faster and faster, it can help us to pause for a moment and take time for ourselves and others. Montblanc products provide a counterbalance to our increasingly hectic lives. As a time anchor, they counteract high touch with high tech.
Writing instruments
Writing instruments are the nucleus of the Montblanc range. Whether piston filler or cartridge filler, ballpoint pen, rollerball or mechanical pencil – they are always pieces of jewellery that seem to write excellently.
Depending on the product line, fountain pens are available in up to 8 different hand-ground nib variations to suit every individual writing style, which can be accentuated by choosing one of the numerous ink colors. Ballpoint pen refills are available in various thicknesses, as are rollerball refills, and pencils are also available in various gradations from fine to the "Sketch Pen with the 5mm refill for drawing."
masterpiece
The masterpiece made of precious resin, introduced in 1924, is the most famous line of writing instruments in the world, available with either platinum-plated or classic gold-plated fittings. The number 4810 on the bicolor rhodium-plated gold nibs - made of 14ct or 18ct yellow gold depending on the product line - stands for the brand's quality standards. Rhodium is a member of the platinum metals family, but is not matte, but rather highly shiny.
The iridium ball on the nib, which is hand-ground to the desired nib width, ensures that the gold nib of a Montblanc fountain pen never wears out. Did you know that every fountain pen manufactured by Montblanc is test-written with colorless ink? This is done by people from different parts of the world because the angle at which a nib is placed on the paper varies between ethnic groups. Only nibs that pass this test in a soundproof room find their way to the top, to the top of a masterpiece. This is an assessment of how smoothly and how quietly the Montblanc nibs glide over the paper.
Masterpiece Solitaire and Masterpiece Doué
Unmistakably masterpieces in form and shape. Particularly exclusive due to the use of materials ranging from wood and leather to precious metals and gemstones.
Bohemians and Starwalkers
In addition to the Meisterstück, two other lines were established: Bohème and Starwalker. The first has a special feature, a nib that disappears into the casing like a lipstick mechanism and is only extended when the fountain pen is to be written with. Bohème is thus reminiscent of the first "Rouge et Noir" fountain pens. In addition to fountain pens, there are also other writing modes such as ballpoint pens, rollerballs and propelling pencils.
The Starwalker is completely different from the elegant and slightly playfully feminine Bohème line: modern, clear and straightforward, and usually equipped with white metal fittings. Above all, the design of the logo on the tip of the cap is eye-catching. The Montblanc star seems to float in clear acrylic. An idea that was later taken to the extreme in the Etoile de Montblanc line: there, the logo is designed in the form of a floating diamond. The cut of this diamond was refined for 7 years until it really combined the shape of the Montblanc logo with the brilliance of a sparkling diamond.
Special Editions
Limited-time editions were created for various occasions to commemorate events or personalities that can be associated with Montblanc itself or the brand's cultural commitment. From Montblanc's 75th anniversary to tributes to musicians such as Herbert von Karajan or Yehudi Menuhin, to film actresses such as Ingrid Bergmann, Greta Garbo or Marlene Dietrich, to special Meisterstück editions as part of the collaboration with Unicef. And let's not forget the Tribute to the Montblanc edition, with which Montblanc dedicated a product line to the brand's namesake - Meisterstücks as white as the snow on the summit of Montblanc.
Writers Editions
Since 1992, Montblanc has been honoring writers with an annual and thus limited-time Writers' Edition in the writing modes of piston fountain pen, ballpoint pen and mechanical pencil. Ernest Hemingway was the first of these Writers' Editions. To date, this has resulted in an impressive list, a small retrospective of world literature:
- 1992 - Ernest Hemingway
- 1993 - Agatha Christie
- 1994 - Oscar Wilde
- 1995 - Voltaire
- 1996 - Alexandre Dumas
- 1997 - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
- 1998 - Edgar Allan Poe
- 1999 - Marcel Proust
- 2000 - Friedrich Schiller
- 2001 - Charles Dickens
- 2002 - F. Scott Fitzgerald
- 2003 - Jules Verne
- 2004 - Franz Kafka
- 2005 - Miguel de Cervantes
- 2006 - Virginia Woolf
- 2007 - William Faulkner
- 2008 - George Bernard Shaw
- 2009 - Thomas Mann
- 2010 - Mark Twain
- 2011 - Carlo Collodi
- 2012 - Jonathan Swift
- 2013 - Honoré de Balzac
- 2014 - Daniel Defoe
- 2015 - Leo Tolstoy
- 2016 - William Shakespeare
- 2017 - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
- 2018 - Homer
- 2019 - Rudyard Kipling
- 2020 - Victor Hugo
Patron of the art
At the same time as the Writers Edition, Montblanc launched the limited editions from the Patron Of The Art series in 1992 to honor personalities from world history who, as patrons, had a significant influence on the art and culture of their era. Until 1994, these editions were limited to 4810 pieces; from the following year, a parallel edition with the same design but even higher quality materials - e.g. gold instead of silver - was launched on the market, of which only a maximum of 888 pieces were produced.
In order of appearance these were
- 1992 - Lorenzo de' Medici
- 1993 - Octavian
- 1994 - Louis XIV
- 1995 - The Prince Regent
- 1996 - Semiramis
- 1997 - Catherine, the Great
- 1997 - Peter, the Great
- 1998 - Alexander, the Great
- 1999 - Frederick II, the Great
- 2000 - Charlemagne
- 2001 - Marquise de Pompadour
- 2002 - Andrew Carnegie
- 2003 - Nicolaus Copernicus
- 2004 - John Pierpont Morgan
- 2005 - Pope Julius II
- 2006 - Sir Henry Tate
- 2007 - Alexander von Humboldt
- 2008 - Francois
- 2009 - Max von Oppenheim
- 2010 - Elizabeth
- 2011 - Gaius Maecenas
- 2012 - Joseph II
- 2013 - Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan
- 2014 - Henry Steinway
- 2015 - Luciano Pavarotti
- 2016 - Peggy Guggenheim
- 2017 - Scipione Borghese
- 2018 - Ludwig II
- 2019 - Hadrian
- 2020 - Moctezuma II
- 2021 - Napoleon Bonaparte
Great Characters
The limited edition Great Characters, which have been published since 2009, posthumously give a stage to people who have shaped and changed the world with their actions. The spectrum so far ranges from the animator Walt Disney to Mahatma Gandhi. It is about the truly great people of world history.
- 2009 - Mahatma Gandhi
- 2011 - Alfred Hitchcock
- 2013 - Albert Einstein
- 2014 - Leonardo da Vinci
- 2015 - John F. Kennedy
- 2015 - Andy Warhol
- 2016 - Miles Davis
- 2017 - The Beatles
- 2018 - James Dean
- 2019 - Disney
- 2020 - Elvis Presley
Accessories – leather goods and watches and jewellery
As already mentioned, mobility and travel were the driving forces behind the development of Montblanc's product range from the very beginning. Writing-friendly leather products were already part of the portfolio in the 1930s, a tradition that Montblanc revived after a long break with the Meisterstück Leather collection in 1995.
Leather goods
While the leather goods came from the factory in Offenbach in 1935, the Hamburg-based company now produces where the expertise is concentrated like a magnifying glass: in its own leather factory in Florence. From there, travel companions made with a lot of handwork from various product lines such as Montblanc Sartorial or My Montblanc Nightflight and Meisterstück Leder come. Regardless of whether they are purses, wallets, backpacks, briefcases, headphone cases and - of course - cases for writing instruments.
Belts are also included, with Montblanc's expertise in metalworking fitting in perfectly here. The high-quality leather belts are usually crowned with a buckle made of palladium or other precious metals.
Watches and jewelry
The breakthrough from a brand for high-quality writing instruments to an international luxury brand probably began with the introduction of the watch range. This took place in 1997 on the Olympus of Haute Horlogerie, at the SIHH in Geneva, the annual trade fair for the highest quality mechanical watches. Less than 10 years later, the brand was already classified by Goldman Sachs as one of the 50 most important watch brands.
A short time later, Montblanc came up with its own watch movements, after previously using ETA movements in series such as Meisterstück, Star or Timewalker, as almost all manufacturers do. Rieussec and Villeret are famous names that stand for watchmaking art made by Montblanc.
With its own calibers manufactured in the Swiss Jura, Montblanc finally made the breakthrough to become an internationally renowned watch and jewelry brand and jumped into the top five of the world's watch manufacturers.
In view of the brand's presence among jewelers, the watch range was expanded to include jewelry for men and women. In addition to fine materials, the Montblanc diamond was also used, which was already used in writing instruments such as the Etoile de Montblanc.