Beautiful Writing: Starting Your New Calligraphy Hobby

by  Christina Schneider

If calligraphy’s lovely lettering has captured your attention, you’re in luck. Calligraphy is more accessible today than at any other point in history. You don’t have to join a monastery or apprentice yourself to a scribe to pick up calligraphy. All you need is a pen or quill, paper, and a lettering guide to start creating beautiful writing.

You can practice calligraphy with a regular pen or pencil, but your final product won’t look very nice because these writing instruments can’t create the angles necessary for calligraphy. You need a quill or pen with a special nib designed for calligraphy. You can purchase a quill, but pens will be easier to start with since you’re used to writing with them. You don’t need to spend hundreds of dollars on a fancy pen. You can purchase a kit with several nibs and ink vials for less than $20. Make sure your kit’s nibs come in multiple widths so you can practice writing different-sized letters.

Once you have your pen or quill, you’ll need calligraphy paper. If you’ve ever had the pleasure of holding an invitation or document with hand-written calligraphy lettering, you may have noticed the thickness of the paper. You’ll want to purchase heavy paper, like the kind used for resumes, to practice your calligraphy. Thick paper absorbs ink and holds your writing in place, plus it adds an appropriate air of formality to your calligraphy. You can practice with regular paper, but you’ll find your letters smearing and your frustration rising. If you want to maximize your enjoyment of calligraphy, purchase the appropriate paper.

The last step to starting your new hobby is choosing a script and a lettering guide. Calligraphy covers many styles; you’ll need to select the one that best matches your goals. If you’re learning calligraphy so you can hand letter invitations for an upcoming wedding, you may want an elegant script like Bookhand or something clean and customizable like Roman. If you’re trying to improve your day-to-day handwriting, Italic is your best bet. To express your artistic side, Celtic, with its knotty embellishments, may be to your liking.

No matter what script you choose, you will need a lettering guide to help you learn it. You can find basic quick reference guides online, but these will only show you the alphabet and are intended for intermediate to advanced calligraphers. As a beginner, you will save time and frustration by finding a calligraphy book to show you the basic lines and curves that compose each alphabet.

Starting calligraphy requires less than $50, but learning to write beautifully will pay dividends for years. You’ll be able to create lovely invitations, thank you notes, letters to friends, and written artwork. Take a trip to your local craft store or favorite hobby website and get ready to enjoy your new hobby.