Lesser Known Ink Brands

[arkgray]

Anyone have recommendations or knowledge of lesser known brands that you might not usually find out about?

[Trebster]

Oh, like the ink line from Bethge Hamburg, which appears to be of J. Herbin origin? I own one bottle of Bethge ink and husband mine carefully, as it does not appear I will be able to replace it easily.

[Joe in Seattle]

Wancher Imari Blue is nice. Watch out for their cheap plastic bottles, though.

[Pterodactylus]

I can recommend the P.W. Akkerman inks, from Den Haag (Netherlands).

Great colors, top ink quality and performance, fancy bottles, good price per milliliter.

[lapis]

Cartier, Made in France, 60 ml... If they themselves didn't manufacture their own inks, I don't even care who does manufacture them. The colours and/or flow and maintenance properties are nothing special.

The main thing here is that the bottles have such a slim neck, that I won't ever again ask a pen of mine if it wouldn't mind getting a fill of same.

 

Mike

[notbob]

I'm still waiting for Fabriano Rosso Fuoco (red) to become available. Looks like a long wait.

[DanielCoffey]

It seems that some of the modern revived pen brands sell "rebadged" inks. Some are up front about it - Onoto selling rebadged Diamine for example - but it always helps to know who the ink originally came from as you may be able to get the exact same product cheaper elsewhere.

 

On the other hand, some places, like The Writing Desk, approach the ink manufacturers and ask to be supplied "economy" bulk bottles. The Writing Desk declare their ink is supplied by Diamine but in 100ml plastic tanks for a very reasonable price.

[alc3261]

It seems that some of the modern revived pen brands sell "rebadged" inks. Some are up front about it - Onoto selling rebadged Diamine for example - but it always helps to know who the ink originally came from as you may be able to get the exact same product cheaper elsewhere.

 

On the other hand, some places, like The Writing Desk, approach the ink manufacturers and ask to be supplied "economy" bulk bottles. The Writing Desk declare their ink is supplied by Diamine but in 100ml plastic tanks for a very reasonable price.

 

Yes, they are like Diamine bottles on steroids!!

[Laura N]

I got a gift of ink from Papier Plume in New Orleans. A very nice blue black in a lovely bottle.

[basterma]

I have used cartridges by Wilson, (a cheap Italian brand) Inoxcrom (Spanish), and Mondial (another cheap Italian brand), as well as bottles of Hero Blue-black and Black inks. The cartridges were fairly usual Royal Blue universal catridges. The Hero inks were decent, with one of them (the black) being lightly scented. I have used a Bethge #4 as well and it seems to made for them by J. Herbin. It wrote really well, but was not too visible in photocopies which was new to me.

[penmanila]

i'm liking my rohrer & klingner sepia--a sepia that's less on the brownish than the grayish-greenish side.

[seffrican]

Online Ink, made by the Online Pen company... http://www.online-pen.de

 

They come in cool colors in tiny 15ml modernist bottles. The lilac is especially eye-shattering.

 

And they never get reviewed or mentioned anywhere.

[alc3261]

Online Ink, made by the Online Pen company... http://www.online-pen.de

 

They come in cool colors in tiny 15ml modernist bottles. The lilac is especially eye-shattering.

 

And they never get reviewed or mentioned anywhere.

 

I tried looking - doesn't seem possible to buy Online, on-line!!

[lapis]

I haven't ever tried to look for any site of theirs, with or without inks. All I know for sure is that their pens are available everywhere here in town, every stationary store, every mall, every post office... accompanied by the fact that I only see cheap, primitive school-type pens.

No harm meant (I use Pelikanos all the time).

 

Mike

[alc3261]

I haven't ever tried to look for any site of theirs, with or without inks. All I know for sure is that their pens are available everywhere here in town, every stationary store, every mall, every post office... accompanied by the fact that I only see cheap, primitive school-type pens.

No harm meant (I use Pelikanos all the time).

 

Mike

 

The pens look interesting and I always like to try different inks etc but their site doesn't seem to let me buy anything and they've no UK stockists.

[alc3261]

I haven't ever tried to look for any site of theirs, with or without inks. All I know for sure is that their pens are available everywhere here in town, every stationary store, every mall, every post office... accompanied by the fact that I only see cheap, primitive school-type pens.

No harm meant (I use Pelikanos all the time).

 

Mike

 

The pens look interesting and I always like to try different inks etc but their site doesn't seem to let me buy anything and they've no UK stockists.

Correction found them!!

[seffrican]

Online Ink, made by the Online Pen company... http://www.online-pen.de

 

They come in cool colors in tiny 15ml modernist bottles. The lilac is especially eye-shattering.

 

And they never get reviewed or mentioned anywhere.

 

I tried looking - doesn't seem possible to buy Online, on-line!!

 

Guess what? A little creative digging turned this up:

 

http://www.theonlinepencompany.com/pencompany/default.php

 

A UK based company, going by the phone number, and they have Online inks. Apparently the name similarity is a coincidence.

 

I have no connection BTW, have done no business with any of them. I only mentioned them because they seem to fit the thread title.

[arkgray]

I can recommend the P.W. Akkerman inks, from Den Haag (Netherlands).

Great colors, top ink quality and performance, fancy bottles, good price per milliliter.

 

 

There are a lot of interesting inks that have been mentioned. I really like the akkerman inks but they seem like they would be pretty expensive to get to the states.

[Pterodactylus]

After using some Akkerman inks I´m almost sure that the manufacturer of the Akkerman inks is Diamine.

 

I would bet money that Akkerman Shocking Blue is identical with Diamine Majestic Blue.

I´ve both, and in a side by side comparison I can see no difference in color, saturation, shading, behave and also the sheen is identical.

 

I still recommend Akkerman inks, if you live in Europe they are a good choice (price, quality, and the bottles are really cool.... maybe if buy more inks it is more ecconomical as they have scaled shipping taxes).

 

Especially Oranje Boven, Voorhout Violet andHofkwartier Groen are great colors (still did not discover the Diamine clones for these).

Also Shocking Blue is great, but if you already have Diamine Majestic Blue you don´t need it.

 

But maybe there are no identical Diamine inks for all Akkerman inks as Diamine also create custom inks like Racing Green for missing-pens.

 

So if you can get Diamine inks easier in the US you are also fine (in my opinion one of the best ink brands out there).

 

The above "Penmanship" is written with Akkerman Shocking Blue (using a Mont Blanc 14 OBB from the 1960ies) ,

the one below with Diamine Majestic Blue (using a Cameron Waverly Eydropper from the 1940ies).

 

http://imageshack.us/a/img708/2899/50z1.jpg

 

http://imageshack.us/a/img547/2629/otrz.jpg

Edited July 18, 2013 by Pterodactylus

[Catsmelt]

I got a gift of ink from Papier Plume in New Orleans. A very nice blue black in a lovely bottle.

 

I have three of their inks (Midnight Blue, Peacock Blue and Moss Green) and I have found P & P's inks to be the most finicky I own. I have yet to find a paper that takes well to these inks. In my experience, they feather on every paper I've written on.

 

I would love to love their inks and support a small business, but I just can't with their inks (though I bought a wonderful Bexley there the last time I was in N.O. -- they threw in the Moss Green as a "thank you").