Brause brand German company founded in 1850 by the Brause brothers to produce pins and nibs. After a dull period of office supply, the company was taken over by the French Clairefontaine. Fortunately the tools to make nibs were still there and thus we still have Bandzug, Cito, Pfannen, Steno, Plakat nibs. The famous Five-line was produced in 1995 on our company's command when William Mitchell stopped making his. Bandzug has a special cutting angle for Fraktur and other "gothic" letters. The metal is sharp, strong, and there is a reservoir on top of each nine numbers. The other Brause nibs are intended for copperplate, spencerian calligraphy and also script style. All are suitable for drawing as well.
William Mitchell brand Created in 1825 in Birmingham by John et William Mitchell, whose Joseph Gillott will marry the young sister before starting himself a nib production. William Mitchell still makes an important range of good quality nibs under these two brands and are more professional and delicate. See Round Hand, Copperplate, Italic, Poster, Scroll, etc.
Speedball brand The best possible nib in terms of strength and metal quality is American. Howard Hunt, who opened his firm in 1899, baptized it "Speedball" and the name was kept for the company. Its catalog offers the famous Speedball "C" (models A, B et D are not used by calligraphers), with squere cuts and left oblique cuts, beside the excellent Hunt nibs and the astounding Steel Brush.
Leonardt brand D. Leonardt created this factory in 1856 at Birmingham. The branch was dropped afterwards but the new owners decided to purchased in 1990 the tools of the bankrupt Austrian firm Hiro in order to launch a new production for school writing in third world countries and fancy nibs in the West.
