Lochby Mini Field Journal vs. Paper Republic Grand Voyageur

Both of them are tough. Both serve a unique purpose. The question really isn't which one of these is better made.

It's which one you will actually have on you when you need it.

Same capacity, very different bulk

I have seen a lot of reviews about these two. I have never seen exactly how much you can fill each one up if you were to stuff it to the rim.

So let's start with the Lochby. It comes with 4 elastics, and I'm going to use all of them. I load the first notebook, then the second, then the third, then the fourth. That's 4 elastics holding 4 notebooks, very comfortably.

It closes, no issues, and it feels great in the hand to carry these around.

You could possibly fit an extra notebook in the back, and that will still close. It's kind of getting tight at that point. Some of the notebooks may need to be moved around.

Keep going and you land at 6, which is probably as much as you're going to get. A loaded package, and pretty impressive for this size.

The Paper Republic doesn't come with the extra bands the Lochby ships with. I just put my notebooks into the two available bands, then added two more on each side to test the same load. One, two, three, four, five, six.

I imagined those would close just fine, and they did.

The beauty of leather is that it starts molding to your notebooks, so you can adjust the spine and everything fits nicely. It's chunky. Not as chunky as the Lochby, because that one has the waxed canvas and the thicker cover.

But it fits 6 notebooks and I don't see any overhang.

I've never actually loaded it that much, because I wouldn't want to carry that many notebooks with me all at once. If I needed to, I could.

One thing worth saying plainly: 6 is my stuffed to the rim test, not the number either brand puts on the box. I didn't confirm Paper Republic's official capacity rating for the pocket size before writing this, so I'm not going to put a number on their spec here. I went well past whatever it is on purpose, because nobody ever shows you where the ceiling actually is.

How thick is each one, really

So if we're going to get pretty nerdy here, let's measure what these ones are.

This one, the leather, is right about a sixteenth of an inch. That's the thickness of the leather itself. Pretty slim.

This one is going to be kind of dependent on where you're measuring it. If you measure the thicker side, you probably get closer to an eighth of an inch, maybe a little more than that.

So it's noticeably thicker, and that's definitely something to consider when you're purchasing between these two.

The honest part

Now this is the honest part, because switching cost me something real.

The waxed canvas is tougher. It's more durable in the sense that if it gets wet you just kind of wipe it away, and you do have to treat your leather a little more. So I did lose a slight amount of durability.

That's something I was okay with losing.

The Lochby is also the one I hand to someone who is rough with gear. If you're more outdoorsy and you carry your stuff around a lot, that's the one I recommend. If I know I'm going to be outdoors, the waxed canvas is the way to go.

In terms of durability, leather is going to last you forever. I have a few leather products that I own and they'll last forever and develop some really nice patina. You can see it get a little shiny, but you can see every mark too, which I actually appreciate, and it makes it my own.

My one real complaint with the leather cover is the elastics. They're just a little thinner, just a little flimsier, and I wish they were a little thicker. The Lochby's elastics are very, very solid.

They hold the notebook super securely. That's something I do miss, and I could probably replace them with something eventually.

What I actually carry now

What I carry right now is 2 notebooks in the Paper Republic Grand Voyageur, pocket size, in olive.

One is the catch-all, where I jot down notes and any random things, and that one comes in and out very often. The other is what I call my collections notebook, where I capture things as they happen that I'd need to reference later.

I like keeping a second notebook so I'm not transferring information from notebook to notebook. They're fairly slim and I go through them in about 2 to 4 weeks, depending on how busy I am.

I've carried one notebook in there and it almost disappeared in the pocket. Now I have two, and it's still pretty slim.

This isn't a new idea either. Benjamin Franklin kept his daily schedule and virtue chart in a small handmade booklet he carried with him. Leonardo da Vinci carried notebooks around to capture ideas as they came.

Pocket carry isn't a trend. It's the original format.

Bottom line

If you leave your notebook in your bag, or in your pocket, or on the desk, leather is going to be a great product. If you are outdoors and maybe a little rougher with your gear, waxed canvas is going to be the better product.

You really cannot go wrong with either of them.

I didn't leave Lochby, either. I still own a few other Lochby products that I use, like the Venture Pouch and the Pocket Journal, for other things. Those covers came out for this comparison. The Venture Pouch and Pocket Journal didn't.

You're not picking a brand. You're picking for a job and a carry.