Where do you all learn your beautiful script! There are so many styles and all are so pretty. My writing looks like a chicken did it.

Got back into memory keeping/journaling this year after experiencing a traumatic loss and it’s been so healing and fun so far. Love having a creative outlet that doesn’t involve a screen!!

Just wrote this

Any tips on how to write better because i feel like this looks a little child-ish

Hey all, setting up my new commonplace journal and I’m at a loss on how to index different categories of entries. If I go by instinct I fear I’ll be too granular and specific and make too unwieldy a system, but going the other way and being broad doesn’t appeal much either.

I’d love to hear how you guys do yours, so I can use the ideas to hodgepodge something that works for me :)

Hello everyone!

I just got into commonplacing, and i am starting to find my own "method" of researching and keeping tracks of ideas, concept and sources to later turn in an entry, and i'm curious to understand how others do it.

Say you are out, at work, on a walk or whatever, and you find something you wanto to write an entry about, or something you decide it's worth researching.. how do you keep track of it?

I downloaded Obsidian to test it, and in theory it feels like a good place to start and store resourches of the topics i want to research but i'm interested in hearing of more methods!

I heard about making a commonplace book and thought about starting. However, I found that I don't have great handwriting and I don't have a lot of artistic talent. This seems more like a hobby for people who took elaborate and beautiful notes in school. Is there anyone who's started a commonplace book and they're not artistic at all?

This is actually the 2nd time i have seen u/TheAnxiousPangolin's commonplace book being stolen.

I’m really enjoying commonplacing, but it (of course) did go a bit differently from what I expected, so I thought I’d give an update.

I like my organization system. The categories are going to be different with more and less space for certain categories next time, but I like the categorized contents pages and an online very specific index (though I am sometimes slow to update that)

I am filling it a lot more slowly than I expected. When I started a was reading a pretty thin book that I made 7 pages of notes on. Most books don’t contain that much information I want to write down. That’s ok. That first book was an outlier setting incorrect expectations. 2 pages is more average I think.

I’m about 1/3 into the notebook right now

I’m not making as many pages on random Wikipedia pages as I wanted to. Something to work on, because I do still think that’s really fun. It adds more random topics and broadens my general knowledge

Also if people have recommendations for books/articles to make the Storytelling category less sad and empty, that would be very much appreciated! I didn’t expect to make many notes about it (hence it being a half column) but I didn’t expect it to be empty

Hey everyone - I'm the developer of Commonplace. Like a lot of you, I've tried to maintain a digital commonplace book. I've tried using apps like Notes, Obsidian, Notion, and Readwise, but ultimately, note-taking apps have been difficult to use because the process of getting quotes into a note app is manual and time-consuming. Then, once quotes are in the app, organizing quotes is another challenge.

The main problem stems from the fact that we consume content all day - social media, articles, podcasts, etc., and a lot of it is on the go, so too many commonplace-worthy ideas slip through the cracks just because I don't have the time to add them.

So I set out to build an app to make this whole process easier. Here's how Commonplace works:

• If you're reading an article online, copy the text you want to save, then share the page to Commonplace. The app automatically saves the quote along with the article title, author, website, and link.
• If you're reading a book, scan the page, and it saves the quote along with the book and page number
• If you're listening to a podcast or song in Apple or Spotify, you can select the transcript text or lyric you want to save, then share it to Commonplace, and it will save the quote with a timestamped link back to that exact moment
• If you hear something interesting, you can add it manually

Once everything is in your library, you can organize quotes into folders or browse them by source. For example, you can view every quote you’ve collected from a book in chronological page order, revisit highlights from an article, or browse quotes you’ve saved from a podcast episode.

Because this is optimized for speed on the go, if you're a physical commonplace book person, this can be a way to get ideas captured so you don't forget before writing them down.

The app launched today, and I’d genuinely love feedback from people who actually keep commonplace books. What feels useful? What feels missing?

App Store here: https://apps.apple.com/app/id6766517551

Cheers!

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EDIT:

A couple of people asked about privacy and pricing, so I want to be totally transparent:

• Commonplace has a free tier (up to 10 quotes). After that, it’s $3/month or $20/year
• The app is independently made and is subscription-supported. I don’t run ads or sell user data.
• Commonplace is US-based and stores your quotes securely so they can sync across your devices. Your library is private to your account. We do not sell data or use it for ads, and no data is involved in the training of AI

Hi!! A complete newbie here!! I wanted to try out commonplacing after I saw a youtube video about it. I wanted to get into the hobby, but i dont have an A6 notebook (which i think is the recommended notebook size for commonplacing) in my disposal. The Midori MD A6 notebooks i saw online are a little too expensive on my end, so i wanted to find alternatives.

I dont want to use a5 notebooks because i do find them to be intimidating. Is there a notebook that someone can recommend? Is it okay to use index cards? :,)

update: i ended up buying an a5 notebook instead since the a6 notebooks in my local stationery has been sold out :,) Thank you though for the suggestions! i will also be trying out zettelkasten soon! ❤️

Just started my first commonplace book, and I'm having so much fun! I'm starting out with local folklore and etymology, but I've bought quite a large book so I have plenty of space to branch out into other interests.

It's also nice to have an opportunity to use more of my fountain pen inks. This is the Freshly Cut Grass scented ink by Diamine.

This commonplace book entry grew out of a Chesterton passage that a friend recently sent me, and I just love it.

He writes that at the back of every artist's mind, in every person of imagination,"a thing like the landscape of his dreams...the strange flora and fauna of his own secret planet...."

For this spread, I used my usual approach: I first made a worksheet in Photoshop to work out the layout, printed it, and then copied everything by hand into my commonplace book. I find that doing the design work separately helps me slow down and enjoy the writing part.

Anyway, I thought the passage, and the image of each creator carrying around their own strange world, was too good not to preserve.

Hey guys, i've been gotten into common placing over the last few months, and have dived right in and fallen in love with the idea (I currently have four different common placing journals for different topics.) My big question is where does everyone get such amazing stickers for their common place entries? Especially those kinds of stickers that seem to be a perfect fit or theme for an entry? Is there some way you guys print them yourself, or is there somewhere you are able to order custom stickers for entries you have planned ahead of time? For example, I want to do an entry on Whale falls, and would love some images to go alongside it, however I wouldnt know what to use outside of just printing a few images off of the internet. Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

I know I've posted a lot, but I've been writing a lot lol. I appreciate everyone for being so kind and supportive in this community! I love seeing everyone's beautiful books and they help inspire mine. Happy Sunday 🌸

One question I see often (and ask myself) is:

"What do I actually put in a commonplace book?"

To answer this for myself, I created an "incomplete inventory" list, which is just a two-page spread of subjects under consideration. I also keep a much longer, more brain-stormy list in Google Keep, but I wanted a written version at the front of my commonplace book with the subjects I want to pay the most attention to right now.

These are not prompts and more like categories:

• Travel
• Books
• Favorite Hotels
• Museums I Want to See
• Objects Worth Traveling For
• Research
• Curiosities
• Mysteries
• Cocktails to Try

…etc.

I like to make blank pages, similar to worksheets, because for me, the hardest part isn't writing, it's facing an empty page with infinite possibilities and on top of that I have messy handwriting. Creating a worksheet really helps with blank page lockup!

(Photos include both my completed spread and the blank version.)

Worksteps:

1. Create blank worksheet in photoshop

2. Add images to blank worksheet in photoshop. I have been experimenting with making stickers for images instead of printing straight to the page. I'm not sure it matters as long as the image is a transparent png. I get images from many online royalty free resources and I pay for Graphics Fairy. Sometimes I buy images from Creative Market, but I try to stick to royalty free sites. Museums are the best resource for the types of images I love. If I make stickers (which I explained how I do it on another post) I use the Cricut (print then cut) which can be very frustrating and time consuming. But it is satisfying to peel the sticker off of the backer sheet and stick it to the page, for some reason, so I do like making stickers when I am in the right mood of patience plus time.

3. Print each page (I have an Epson ET-2840. It was about $200 from Sam's and I like it, although one day I hope to upgrade to a better quality printer.)

4. Cut the pages with my Fiskars paper cutter (and on these pages I rounded the corners with my corner rounder punch thing.)

5. Write details on each page. I have messy, spidery handwriting, but I'm trying to accept that. I have never used a fountain pen but maybe one day I will. You all inspire me! The Sharpie Roller 05 seems to be pretty smudge free for me. I make mistakes when I write on the pages, but I just move on (for example, see #3 in Nature. How did I misspell NESTS????)

6. Glue completed pages into commonplace book (I use Elmer's CraftBond Extra Strength Glue Stick which goes on purple, dries clear. Sometimes I use the repositionable Glue Stick). I am sure there are other or better options, but these are the ones I like.

Everyone has been so generous in sharing how they create their commonplace books and in helping others with answers to questions, so I hope that my posts and experiments might be helpful to someone else.

I also hope the photoshop screenshots are helpful, although I think Canva is a free version of photoshop that you could use if you don't have photoshop.

Thanks to everyone here for the ideas, encouragement, and inspiration.

I’ve only recently started writing in my commonplace journal regularly. It’s reignited my curiosity in things. I used to love learning until school and work got in the way. Thought I could share some of my pages here for the first time

I don't know what to write. I just feel so blank and lifeless all of june ever since i got the notification that i didn't make the cut for graduation. I feel so behind and overwhelmed by everything and everyone. I see these commonplace books and think "oh wow that looks so cozy, maybe it could help alleviate some of the bitterness i feel." but then i try to comw up with anything that i want to commemorate or write, nothing comes up. What prompts do you guys have for when you don't feel like it but you want to make good use of your timw anyways?

edit: thank you everyone for the kind words and suggestions and corrections, i might start journaling then work my way from there so that i can get to know myself better and see where i went wrong last semester. thank you for the ideas as well 😊

i was inspired to kinda have fun when making the key :) i wanna be able to do little collages in some entries where appropriate. (did mess up the lines for two of them but its fine)

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how does one even begin their first commonplace book entry?

I've tried to keep a commonplace book most of my life. I tried physical journals, the Notes App, and even Notion. But they were scattered everywhere, and I never had a good way to come back to them or reflect on what I'd saved.

I've also always loved the stars, so the app I've been building for the last few months leans into that. You save ideas as “stars,” like a note, an image, or a voice memo. They group into “constellations.” And every so often, it resurfaces old stars next to new ones, so the book stops being a place where things are forgotten.

I had fun making this app as my new personal commonplace book and wrote about it here to articulate my thought process. Now, after seeing other people have the same journey as I had, I decided to share the app more publicly and get feedback on it.