Q&A: What is Everyday Carry?

Why what you take with you matters

At its most literal level Everyday Carry (or EDC as it is commonly known as) is the collection of objects you keep with you every day, either in your pockets or bag. These are the things you hardly ever leave the house without, those truly essential items.

Whilst for most people this will consist of their phone, keys and wallet for others it can be a lot more, and in our case obviously this entails a bit more stationery. The main thing you should think about first above all else when it comes to your everyday carry is utility, although this doesn’t mean that you can’t have a few frivolous items that you still deem a must-have.

To show you more I’ve taken a picture of what I never leave the house without and will explain my personal reasons for why each item has earned its place in my EDC. Obviously as you can see there are some vital items in my EDC that aren’t stationery, my phone, sunglasses, credit cards and such but there are still 7 (possibly 8) bits of stationery that I couldn’t go without.

This is a fantastic bit of stationery to keep with you every day, whilst it may not be the best notebook for fountain pens it more than makes up for it with its brilliant cover that allows you to store a remarkable amount of things in its handy zip-lock exterior. You don’t even have to unzip it to open the notebook so it is really easy to quickly jot something down or refer to it, and the bag is so spacious I can fit everything in my EDC in it with ease.

What’s even better is that you can simply replace the notebook inside, and there are a number of handy accessories for it such as a sticky note insert, or a perforated notebook; you can even join two notebooks together in one with the joint file. Whilst it’s very versatile and useful it also comes in a range of colours and styles, I particularly love this shade of the Cockatoo series.

Although not the most portable pen in world given its weight and size, it more than makes up for it in three ways for me: style, durability, quality. First off the Dude is quite simply a beautiful bit of Japanese design, to me it looks like a Bialleti espresso make crossed with a space ship, its modern angles are pleasing to the the eye and comfortable to hold (it doesn’t hurt that it goes so well with a Kaweco AL). Secondly its stainless steel material, which contributes to its weight, means that it is very durable, and finally its very high quality, which means it might cost a bit more than you’d expect but it also writes brilliantly and feels like it is built to last.

The Kaweco is of course a clear choice for your EDC fountain pen, not many people want to lug around a Lamy 2000 and a bottle of ink, the Kaweco cleverly uses its cap to store the bulk of the pen inside making it one of the shortest pens when capped so it can fit easily in your pocket. The metal AL and Brass versions are also very durable so there is little worry of it snapping and leaking in your pocket, although it does make it a bit heavier. As you can see I’ve got a bit of a silver theme going on in my choices of writing utensils.

Why on earth carry a turn clip with you everywhere? Well it turns out these are useful for a lot more than just clipping bits of paper together, a quick google for so called ‘Life Hacks with Bulldog Clips’ will show just a glimpse of the dozens of uses people have found for these humble bits of stationery. Although some are a bit naff I’ve found one that actually helped solve a daily problem, that of the tangled headphones, using one of the brass Travelife clips I found a great way to store my headphones so that they wouldn’t get tangled like so.

Okay… this one might be a bit of an indulgence, I’ll admit I haven’t found myself out and about when I urgently needed some washi tape, but it might happen! In any case there are so many uses for washi tape and they can easily be popped into a Mark’s Storage.it there’s no harm in keeping some with you every day right?

Field Notes produces great little notebooks that are perfect for popping in your pocket when you’re on the go. They come in packs of 3 and the Expedition is an ingenious version that’s perfect for any EDC: made with waterproof and tearproof paper it’s a great choice of notebook to keep with you.

Last but not least I keep a Mark’s Days mechanical pencil with my (sometimes also an OHTO Sharp 2.0 for sketching) as its a super light pencil that goes well with my other silvery stationery, isn’t expensive and is useful for drawings or making notes that I can rub out later.

So that’s it, everything I carry with me almost every day. As you can see there is a lot of stationery, and its all got a bit of a silvery/metallic theme to it now that I take a closer look… So let us know what you can’t leave the house without, and is any of it stationery?

Isaac