8 Phenomenal Pens Esquire Editors Love Writing With

It's strange, but even in 2025, the world of stationery feels unnecessarily gendered. In one corner, you have kawaii stationery corners in bookstores. You get to try pens in all sorts of fun colors, washi tape, little notebooks, and the rest. In the other corner, you have the luxury pen category. It's designer stores where associates in suits sell you—as well as other clientele, also in suits—on the idea that this is the pen a man like you would want.

In the perfect medium—between craftsmanship and indivifduality—there is a niche to be explored. For us, Benu owns this niche. A funky little Armenian pen maker, Benu uses a proprietary to produce these jaw-dropping resin designs on the bodies of its pens, and each design is technically unique to that pen.

Of course, these are handcrafted pens, so all the writing experience stuff is top notch. Ink flows properly, the feedback from the nibs is always great, and the pens feel good in the hand.