A3 Doodle Project – May 2026

Continuing my A3 Doodle Project, here is the May doodle. I started doing this Petals pattern, knowing it was one that I enjoyed and that it could take up a lot of space, but I soon realized I didn’t know how to tie the separate patterns together into one big, cohesive doodle. It turns out I ran out of time and didn’t figure out a way to do it, so this doodle is basically some smaller, standalone doodles that are all on the same piece of paper.

Once the pattern gets filled in, it feels much more complex

For this pattern I used a TWSBI Diamond 580ALR with a broad nib and paired it with J. Herbin Bleu Austral ink. I found that this ink starts out really dark after the pen has sat for a day or so without use, so I tried to do some scribbles before using it so that it would shade a bit better. Still, there are parts of the doodle that are darker than others. In an ideal world this wouldn’t be the case.

Here’s a look at the pattern before I filled it in.

This broad TWSBI nib is nice and wet.

Overall this was an enjoyable doodle to make, but I didn’t get to spend as much time on it as I would have liked. If I had, I probably would have come up with some way to connect the individual pieces. Still, since this is only for me and my enjoyment, I had a good time doing it, so mission accomplished.

This blue ink shows a bit of sheen when viewed at an angle.

One thing I did find, and I found it with previous doodles as well, is that I tend to rotate my paper a lot while doodling. With smaller pieces of paper this isn’t a problem, but with an A3 sheet it can be tedious. Because of this, I smeared a few spots in this doodle. While that’s the nature of doodling with a fountain pen, it’s also something I plan to be more vigilant about in future doodles.

This pattern is fun to do since it can take on so many shapes.