Fingers Were Meant to be Inky
Is iron gall ink Public Enemy #1, or just a poor, misunderstood schmuck caught up in an unfair war of opinions?
Some people avoid it like the plague, flat-out stating that it will eat your pens, paper, pets, and children. Others use it exclusively, saying it’s perfectly safe and they bathe in it and pour it over their cereal with no ill effects… Read More
But first…a song!
There’s red in my head, but I don’t want it
The blues were swarming there in my soul
Shadows over me and
The only colour I can paint my soul
I want black and don’t fade away
I want it black forever
Inside of me, all I wanna see’s the colours in my head
I’m in black the only way
And make it black forever
Go inside and…go inside and…never come back out again
—Black Forever by WASP (One of the best bands, EVER!)
Sorry…I’ve expended the interesting bits of inside information I have on Robert Oster and his inky endeavors, so I don’t have much to lead off this post with. So instead, you get heavy metal lyrics about colors. Yes…it’s your lucky day.
Honestly, by this point, the man and his company probably don’t need much… Read More
Robert Oster might be the hardest working man in the fountain pen ink industry these days. Yeah, yeah, I know…I can hear the chorus of “What about Nathan Tardif?” and I haven’t even pushed the Publish button yet. True Story: Nathan is a machine. But this post isn’t about him, it’s about Rob Oster, who exploded onto the fountain pen scene not even a year ago, but has managed to win the hearts and minds (and money) of fountain pen users across the globe in that very short timespan.
It seems like we can’t go more than a couple weeks without… Read More
About a year ago, I started to see KWZ inks mentioned on the Fountain Pen Network and shortly afterward, I noticed them for sale at Vanness. They started to get lots of positive “press” around the innernets from various reviewers and blogs, and I picked up a couple samples. I instantly fell in love with Foggy Green, and decided they warranted a closer look.
KWZ Ink is a small ink company run by chemists Agnieszka and Konrad Żurawski in a town just outside of Warsaw, Poland. The KWZ vision began in 2012 when Konrad—unhappy with the performance and variety of the Iron Gall (IG) inks that were available—decided to try creating his own. Konrad used his super-charged chemistry skills to… Read More
Organics Studio (OS) is a company I (regretfully) avoided early on. When I started working with fountain pens a few years ago, there was a pretty big kerfuffle going on about certain “boutique” ink brands. People were complaining about SITB (Slime/Stuff in the Bottle) issues with Private Reserve. Others were swearing up and down that Noodler’s Baystate Blue was eating their pens. There was a lot of FUD going on. Some things I chose to ignore (I did buy a pile of Noodler’s ink), but others stuck with me. For some reason, I lumped Organics Studio in with all the scary issues. I think there was one or two reports of SITB in their inks, so I relegated them to the “Do Not Bother” list.
Fortunately, I kept hearing a lot of good things about these inks, and decided to give them a try anyway (plus, even giant brands like Montblanc and J Herbin had issues with SITB, so the one or two reported occurrences with OS inks seemed more like anomalies than an ongoing issue). Unfortunately
Google+ has a really nice fountain pen community going. It’s not super busy there, but a group of dedicated regulars keep the conversation going. There’s a lot of information sharing, show-and-tell, and (of course) questions & calls for recommendations. Regular contributor Nathan stopped in to ask for recommendation: He was looking for a blue similar to Noodler’s Navy, but that was even more water-resistant.
CHALLENGE ACCEPTED!!!!
I knew that Noodler’s published a
… Read More
Australia has a lot of the grooviest things on this planet. They have the best spiders. They have the coolest snakes. They have the cutest marsupials. If that wasn’t enough, a mighty wave of new and little-known ink companies are emerging from the wild and wonderful island continent. In the last year, I’ve learned of four such companies from the land Down Under: Toucan, Blackstone, Bookbinders, and the newest kid on the block, Robert Oster Signature. Nestled in the heart of South Australia’s wine country, Robert Oster Signature is a (mostly) one-man outfit run by (you guessed it)… Read More
Callifolio is a line of fountain pen inks from French art supply manufacturer Artisan Pastellier. They actually have two lines of ink (their other is Encre Classique, which are mixable so you can create your own colors). Artisan Pastellier also makes art pastels, watercolors, natural & metallic pigments, sealing wax, and a few other brightly colored art supplies.
There’s not much talk of the Callifolio inks out there, and I only know of… Read More
Pilot is arguably the biggest name in pens. If you’ve ever put a long, pointy thing in your hand and wrote with it, you’ve undoubtedly used a Pilot product along the way. Pilot is a Japanese company, and regardless of whether you’re using a cheap, throw-away ballpoint or a $5,000 makie fountain pen, their products are all made with impeccable quality, and you’re sure to experience a nice, trouble-free writing experience.
In addition to pens, Pilot makes a wonderful line of bottled inks for fountain pens. While other brands shoot for vibrant, highly saturated color palettes, Pilot aims for colors that mirror the beauty found in nature. Here’s a description from the Pilot web site:
The name Iroshizuku is a combination of the Japanese words Iro (Coloring), expressing high standards and variation of colors, and Shizuku (Droplet), that embodies the very image of dripping water. Each ink name derives from the expressions of beautiful Japanese natural landscapes and plants, all of which contribute to the depth of each individual hue.