PILOT Parallel Calligraphy Pen Set, 2.4mm Nib with Black and Red Ink Cartridges (90051) Review (2026)

Who this pen is built for

This is a single-width Parallel Pen with a 2.4mm stub italic nib, a size retailers describe as a comfortable middle ground between fine text work and larger display lettering. It suits letterers who already know they want a broad-edge, italic-style pen and do not need the smaller 1.5mm or larger 3.8mm and 6.0mm widths that come in Pilot's full four-pen set. Beginners exploring italic or blackletter hands for the first time, or anyone who wants one reliable pen for greeting cards, envelope quotes and practice sheets, are the best fit. It is not the right choice for pointed-pen copperplate or brush lettering, since the parallel-plate nib only produces broad-edge, angular strokes.

How the parallel nib works

Unlike a traditional single-slit italic nib, this pen's nib is made of two parallel metal plates, a design Pilot uses across its whole Parallel Pen range. Retailer product pages describe this construction as distributing ink more evenly than conventional italic nibs while producing sharper edges than a felt-tip calligraphy marker. The nib can be used two ways: the narrow 0.5mm edge for monoline writing, or the full 2.4mm broad edge for classic calligraphic thick-and-thin strokes. The set includes one black and one red ink cartridge, a converter for flushing the pen with water or bottled ink, and a nib cleaner, so everything needed to start lettering is in the box aside from paper.

Day-to-day use and upkeep

Because the pen is cartridge-fed, getting started is as simple as inserting a cartridge and priming the nib, and switching between the black and red cartridges lets you add accent color to envelopes or headings without a second pen. Retailer guidance recommends flushing the nib with water every couple of weeks and whenever you switch ink colors, since dried ink between the parallel plates can affect the stroke's crispness; the included converter makes this straightforward by drawing water through the nib unit. The pen also accepts Pilot's CON-40 converter for bottled ink or can be filled by the eyedropper method, which gives more ink options than the cartridges alone. Regular cleaning matters more here than with a standard fountain pen because the twin-plate nib is the whole point of the design.

How it compares with other Parallel Pens

Against Pilot's own four-pen P9005SET, which bundles the 1.5mm, 2.4mm, 3.8mm and 6.0mm nibs together, this single 2.4mm pen is the better buy for someone who already knows the mid-size width suits their work and does not want to pay for three sizes they may rarely use. Compared with the Pilot Enso Parallel Pen set, which repackages all four nib sizes as a gift-ready bundle for new letterers, this individual pen skips the gifting format and the smaller and larger widths entirely. Neither rival changes the core limitation shared by every Parallel Pen: all are broad-edge, italic-style nibs, not pointed-pen or brush tools, so none suit copperplate or modern brush calligraphy.

Verdict and who should choose differently

At our score of 8.3 out of 10, this pen earns its place as a focused, mid-width tool for italic and blackletter lettering, with the parallel-plate nib delivering sharp strokes and the bundled cartridges making it ready to use right away. Choose it if you already know you want a 2.4mm nib, or if you are buying a first Parallel Pen and plan to add other widths later as separate purchases. Choose the four-pen set instead if you want to experiment with different scales from the start, and look at a pointed nib or brush pen entirely if your interest is in copperplate, spencerian or brush lettering styles.

Frequently asked questions