An inlay kit pen is a brave pick for a first attempt, and the hardest part has to be placing roughly fourteen tiny pieces into a curved barrel. The maker describes it as a jigsaw puzzle bent around a cylinder, yet says the kit is nothing too daunting. The finished pen backs that up, with the dog design sitting cleanly in brown and lighter woods across the barrel.
The build itself follows the classic pen path. A light-colored blank went on a metal mandrel with white bushings at each side, and the shaping happened on the lathe. Sawdust and shavings ended up on the bed along the way, so plenty of real material came off the blank.
The details are what sell this one. One side carries a cartoon dog, complete with ears that flop, eyes, a muzzle and paws, while the reverse shows brown spots marking the animal's back. Spreading the artwork around the whole barrel is a lovely touch, and the finished blank was turned by hand at the end to show the full circumference.
Best of all, there is a story behind it: a gift for the maker's wife, timed to a new puppy arriving next week. The only trade-off I can see is piece count versus confidence. Fourteen parts sounds fiddly to me, but the maker calls the process not that hard, which is a reassuring note for anyone hesitating over a first inlay attempt.