We’re big fans of disc bound notebooks and the flexibility that they allow, so we made a special effort to import from France some notebooks from the Clairefontaine Clairing collection. If you’ve never used disc bound notebooks, what makes them so special is the ability to easily add or remove pages and creatively re-order and organize your notebook pages whenever and however you want. All of the Clairefontaine Clairing notebooks that we have on hand at the moment are A4 size, and each one has a different type of rule – graph, graph with margin, lined with margin and French ruled. I think it would be fun to get a few Clairing notebooks with different kinds of rules and create my own custom notebook such as one with alternating graph and ruled pages, or even a notebook that has one section of graph paper, another section of French ruled paper and a third section of lined paper. I’d probably share one of these custom notebooks with a friend that has never used French ruled paper or experienced the smoothness of Clairefontaine paper.
Instructions come with each Clairing notebook showing the best way to insert and remove the pages. The copy below shows the wrong way to do it – taking the paper off the rings by pulling it sideways out of the notebook. This can cause the punches that hold the paper onto the rings to tear.
The next photo shows the best way to remove pages – by pulling them up and towards you, you can remove pages gently without tearing the punched side of the page.
To put a page back into the notebook just reverse what you did to pull them out – starting with either the top or bottom of the page gently push each punch back onto the plastic rings.
Ta-dah! Your notebook has been refreshed and reorganized.
We’re expecting to have an expanded selection of Clairing notebooks in our store sometime in May. Do you use disc bound notebooks? Why do you like them? Are there any other Clairefontaine Clairing notebooks you’d like to see available in our store? Please feel free to share your thoughts and requests!
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I was thinking of ordering one or two of the Clairefontaine Clairing notebooks until I saw the Myndology notebooks and ordered two of them. I’ve also recently bought two “Whitelines” notebooks. They are very cool.
Dennis –
I’ve used both the Clairing and the Myndology notebooks and I like them both. We hope you enjoy Myndology! I also have a small Whitelines notebook and I like the grey paper more than I thought I would. Thanks so much!
I would love to see CLairefontaine’s Student Book with refillable books. Looks very practical, and I think the students would love then. They are of the size 225mm x 297mm They come with Seyes, 5mm squares and
lines with margin. They can be found on Clairefontaine’s French website, the catalogue, page 41.
Tres chique!
We are looking to purchase notebooks that we can refill with our recycled paper. Are we able to do that with these books? Also how hard is the Cover? We would like to be able to flip the cover to the back and use it as a hard surface to write on our laps. Please advise on these. Thank you.
Hello Nicole,
It might be possible to refill these notebooks with your recycled paper. You would need to find a special punch to make the kind of holes in the paper that a disc bound notebook requires. I would recommend using a good quality paper that does not tear too easily. Clairefontaine uses 90g paper and Myndology disc bound notebooks use 70lb text. The Clairefontaine notebook cover is laminated card stock that is somewhat flexible. Disc bound notebooks are also available with flexible polypro covers. The covers need to be a bit flexible so that they can slip on and off of the discs. You can check out our full line of disc bound notebooks here: http://shopwritersbloc.com/discbound.html
Hi! I’m definitely considering purchasing one of these for school – they look awesome! I love Clairefontaine paper. It is kind of an investment for a notebook, so I’d love to be able to refill it when I use up all the pages. Are refills are available from Clairefontaine? Alternatively, do you know if maybe the Staples Arc hole punch is compatible and does Clairefontaine make A4 size lined loose sheets I could use to refill the notebook? Thanks so much!
Hi Sarah,
The last time we checked Clairefontaine was not making refills for their disc bound notebooks. If you are interested in the Koverbook, we would suggest refilling it with paper from one of Clairefontaine’s less expensive laminated cover disc bound notebooks such as this one: Clairefontaine Clairing Notebook – Large, Lined with Margin
Another option would be to use Myndology disc bound notebooks since they make several different kinds of refills.
We haven’t tried using the Arc or Circa punches to make refills for the Koverbook – it’s possible that they might work. Clairefontaine does make A4 size lined loose sheets, but they have hole punches in them so they might not work as refills.