Claro Signature Pen, 0.7 mm

A signature pen is a fineliner sold for the one job where the line has to look deliberate. The tip is firm enough to hold a constant width through the loops and cross-strokes of a signature, so the result reads as a signature rather than as handwriting that happened to be a name.

0.7 mm is the standard weight for it, and the reasoning is practical: finer than that and a signature looks thin beside 11-point type on a printed page; heavier and the loops start to fill in on themselves. In practice a pen like this earns its keep by living in one drawer and being used only for documents — so that it is never the pen that has run dry at the moment somebody needs a form signed.

• 0.7 mm constant-width tip
• Holds its width through loops and cross-strokes
• For documents, forms and contracts
• Keep it capped and keep it for one job