If I hadn’t read the manual, I would’ve missed it. Hermes has cleverly indicated the margin location on the paper bail with a red thermometer-like bar, making it The Visible Flying Margin! Move the carriage to the desired margin location with the carriage release button, then release the lever to set it. Gone are the clunky moveable margin tabs found in many other typewriters, in its place are a set of left and right levers that when depressed unlock the margin. Hermes calls them Visible Flying Margins. If you’re a frequent margin setter, setting them on the 3000 is a bit tricky at first, but super fast once you get it. They fly! But hey, perhaps the slower return on the Hermes is by design, makes you pause and take in that beautiful line of prose before charging ahead into the next. Olympia SM-series and Olivetti Studio 45 & Lettera 32 have Hermes beat on this note. Good thing it has a big handle, because you’ll need all the leverage you can muster. What wouldn’t work with a light touch was the carriage return. At first you might feel the need to punch the keys hard, but after playing around a bit with tapping the keys as light as I could, I was amazed how little effort was required to make a strong imprint. The feeling is strong and assertive, producing a nice thunk thunk thunk sound. The typing action of the “new version” feels like what I remembered in the “original version.” They keys are big and cuppy, that it’s hard to miss a beat. The new version looks more elegant and refined, yet retains its distinctive style and color that you’ll never confuse it with an Olympia SM9. I may be going against the Hermes 3000 purists crowd when I say I was never fond of the bulbous contours of the original.
While the “new version” is more boxy than the original, the curves are still there, but more subtle. Really? C’mon, Hermes, that’s the best you could call it? The new version? Why not the 4000? Why Hermes ever went with numbers I’ll never know, when they had great names like “Rocket” and “Ambassador.” It’s too bad Royal had a typewriter called The Empress, because that’s what I would’ve called the 3000! Is the Hermes 3000 still up to snuff? The one I got is the “New Version” as Hermes calls it. While my Lettera 32 is where the work happens, that Erika 5 is a sweet diversion. That’s why I keep an Erika 5 stashed away.
A pre-1960s Erika is another dopamine fix. What’s more, it’s the type of typewriter that gets the juices going. I’ve gone through stacks of typewriters over the years, yet the Hermes 3000 is one of the few that left a distinct impression in how it felt, worked and sounded. That’s how long it has been since I reviewed the 3000.
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