These are lovely Filofaxes. I have written about my personal Cuban in brown before – here. These are slightly different in that they are zipped and have 30mm rings.
This model has been discontinued but it really is lovely. The leather is smooth and soft but strong and sturdy – reminds me of harness leather. I used my black one a lot and it never showed any great wear at all – just a scuff and a dent or two. I gave it to a friend and she is still using it every day.
The zipped version is inconvenient in that it does not lie flat unless you really train it. So it is awkward to use if you need your binder to be flat. It is also sometimes a faff to open and close the zips, paper gets caught in the zip if you are not careful and, the top credit card pocket is difficult to get into. For this reason I find it impossible to use as a wallet.
BUT, it keeps your goodies safe and hidden, you can put in papers that are not on rings or in the pockets (just be careful how you open it) and the rings are those unicorns – 30mm rings! And the leather, oh the leather! Another thing (and this I have not tried), the inserts look really small because the binder is wider than a normal personal sized. This may mean that you can use wider inserts like FC.
Thank you. I’ll give it a chance.
May I ask how you ‘train’ your brown one- I really would like to keep mine.
I just keep using it and every now and then bending it gently, further and further each time.
Lovely Filofaxes. I just bought the chili personal Cuban last week – without zip. I find it very beautifull, but, as you mentioned, it does not lay flat at all. Don’t know if I can live with that or I should returnere it to the shop. Doesn’t it bother you, Janet?
Another reason I like it, is that it looks ‘ grown up’ and classy, whitch cannot be said about many of the newer Filofax models
I can only speak for my black one but it lay flat after a bit of use and training. The brown one is already going a little flatter every day. I am not sure about the brown one as zippered binders very seldom obey without really bending them very hard and I hate doing that!