Hello Everyone!
My Dad is a Senior Manager within a large corporate company and he uses a cheap small diary (that is probably free from suppliers most of the time) to help him keep track of meetings and travel arrangements in his hectic worklife.
On his days off he has a Harley Davidson that he customises and takes to shows etc. He’s a huge Harley Davidson fan and I wanted to sort of… fuse the two lifestyles a little – show a little professionalism and yet a bit of personality to his working life.
So I thought a Filofax would be perfect for him. I didn’t want to get him anything bigger or smaller than a binder that took Personal size papers (Pocket would be too small A5 too bulky for his Briefcase and Personal size papers are the most common – larger choice), so I had the choice of an original Personal, Compact or Slimline. My dad isn’t much of a “clasp” fan either so I narrowed it down to a Slimline.
Looking around I really liked the look of the Slimline Holborn however I never got chance to see it in the flesh – however I came across the Slimline Finsbury in Staples – which I absolutely KNEW was the binder for my dad. It was perfect. Looking at the Personal Finsbury they seem really stiff however the Slimline is almost as malleable as my Malden, which I’m really pleased about.
When I got it home I couldn’t wait to get my vision into action!
When I first took it out of the box, it didn’t lay completely flat, but I wanted a “ready to go” feel for my dad to just “run with it”. It hardly required training to stay flat, after flexing the binder a bit it’s really pliable and floppy 🙂
I added some original Filofax tabs from my own stash first of all, then began moving things around for his ease of use.
Course, I couldn’t stop there, I felt inspired to make this a fantastic, personal present for him. So, out came the cardstock, Mac scissors etc…
And then I created this first of all:
The Slimline Finsbury did not come with a ruler so out of thin cardstock and a printed Harley Davidson embelm I created my own… and then I couldn’t stop once I started:
Once they were hole punched and placed in the Slimline Finsbury, they looked like this:
Not content with just the front page and the ruler being customised, I used the Harley Davidson embelm yet again to “watermark”all of the inserts!
The pen I’ve got for him is the same style pen I use – Uniball Phantom, which is an erasable rollerball I found in WHSmiths.
I liked the Slimline Finsbury so much… I had to get myself one too! Yep! No idea what I’ll use it for but I just like looking at it…! I’m sure I’ll find some use for it…
Until then.. Peace out!
Kel
x
The Pocket Diaries 
That is fantastic – and what a perfect gift 🙂
ThanksLJ! I hope my dad feels the same!
Kel
X
Thats fantastic personalisation. I want to see a video of him umboxing it!
Hi Helen: what a great idea! Unfortunately I don’t think he cares much for hand crafted personalised stationery, in fact, he will probably think I have brought it like that haha!
Kel
X
Looking good!
How did you do the watermarking?
Hi Natalie
I use a mac and I downloaded a free office package called OpenOffice.org. In the writer application (similar to word), I pasted the picture onto my pre-set-up filofax size paper, fiddled about with the size a bit etc.
when you left click or select your image, you get a small options pop up next to your image, within that box it asks how transparent you want the selected item to be. I selected 75%.
Hope this helped?
Kel
X
What a nice and thoughtful gift for your Dad!
Thank you so much for your lovely words Gail… I hope he likes it because I worked hard and spent weeks researching and searching for the perfect “no compromises” filofax and spent a night making the bits and bobs! I want it to be perfect for my perfect dad 🙂
Kel
X
Fabulous job!
Thank you for your lovely words aimless allee x
What an excellent gift! I’d be delighted to receive something like this!
Thanks Cruz 🙂 I think he likes it
he’s using it anyway! X
What a lovely personalised present from a wonderful daughter. 🙂 Really enjoyed reading this. The watermarks and mods. are outstanding. I’m using my late wife’s slimline leather Finsbury which I love using now. Stylish! Nice to go back to pen and paper and I’ve just ordered the quadrille paper and A-Zs for it. 🙂
Great work and lovely post.
Thank you for your kind words Michael. My dad has mentioned that he does get a lot of comments on his filofax, and I really need to get him another set of inserts printed ready for Christmas for him!
I’m sorry to hear about your wife: it sounds like you are cherishing her memory by keeping something that meant a lot to her with you, it’s almost as though you are sharing your life/schedule and connecting with her still in a way. She obviously had good taste 🙂
I hope you’re enjoying using the slimline Finsbury: I found that due to the lack if the clasp it had more of a unisex look to it and less of a trademark filofax look to it, just in case dad didn’t want to lose his street Cred at work ;). It looks like a stylish little black book instead!
Kel
X
Brilliant!
Thanks for your lovely words – true, it feels absolutely the right thing to do and for it live on. You’re right about the clasp which a lot of them have. Definitely good taste 🙂
You have a great way of thinking, and a nice eye for detail there!
Michael