Private Reserve Ebony Blue

[SaskNapolean]

Sorry if this is missing some of the nuts and bolts of other reviews, but I thought I would share my experience with Ebony Blue. It is just copy and pasted from my blog so please check it out as I am just getting started!

My first review, so It should be my favourite ink naturally. Browsing around on reddit and other pen blogs (hi fellow bloggers!) I don’t see this ink being recommended too often and I definitely haven’t seen anyone say that this their favourite. If I am alone on this one, so be it. If you are also a proud Ebony Blue fanatic please let me know! The reason why I love this ink breaks down easily into 2 things: colour and sheen. This tells you almost nothing, so let me explain.

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In my stealth black Vanishing Point

The Colour

First I want to talk about why I own the ink. Well when I first got into fountain pens and began browsing pen stuff for hours online, I finally stumbled upon GouletPens.com. After looking at what it seems like every single ink on the website, I came across Ebony Blue, the perfect shade of dark blue/teal that was just screaming my name. I immediately put it in my cart and let it sit there for weeks, taunting me every time I would visit the gorgeous Ebony Blue, which ended up being almost daily. I finally decided to pull the trigger, but to make up for expensive shipping to Canada, I ordered 5 bottles of ink. For the curious, they were Diamine Ancient Copper, Eclipse, and Green/Black, along with Private Reserve Avacado. Just imagine how the wait felt like waiting for this pen haul. Also keep in mind that I didn’t really understand the benefit of ink samples at the time. If I like the colour online, that means I will love the ink right? Well I’ve gotten over that now (check out My Collection for all of the samples I own now).

Funny story to go with this. I also had a fairly large wish list piling up on WonderPens.ca that I also decided to pull the trigger on at the exact same time (I had a few Visa gift cards). Guess which sample I forgot to remove from my order. Yup, Ebony Blue. Needless to say I didn’t use the sample before diving right into the bottle.

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Swab of Ebony Blue

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Writing Sample

The Bottle

When I purchase a bottle of ink, I always consider what the bottle looks like and how it will look sitting on my desk. The 66ml bottles are what all of my Private Reserve Inks came in. They are a fairly simple cylinder shaped bottle (yes, a little geometry) with a fairly simple label on in. Nothing to fall in love with right? Well when my girlfriend first saw these bottles sitting on my desk, you would have thought they were made of diamonds and were made for The Louvre. This made me appreciate them more than I did at first, but also gave me some leverage to buy more Private Reserve Ink.

This next part did not make her happy and may or may not make you cringe, but my lovely bottle of Private Reserve Ebony Blue that was fit for a museum has some battle scars. Here is what a pristine bottles looks like:

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Picture Courtesy of Wonderpens (50ml bottle)

And here is what my bottle looks like:

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Battle Scars

If you are curious to how this can happen, I suppose I can indulge. I was refilling my pen before leaving for school one day and everything was going according to plan. When I went to put the lid back on, it did not line up correctly the first time, so instead of doing what a logical person would do and lift up the lid and try again, I decided to twist the cap backwards to let the threads line themselves up. DON’T DO THIS!!! Apparently that created a vacuum that was pulling ink up and eventually exploded the ink outwards all over the bottle and my desk. Not the best way to start a day I’ll tell you.

The Sheen

For those of you who don’t know, sheen is when you can see a different colour, usually where the ink goes on wet or pools, than what it is actually supposed to be. There is probably a more detailed/scientific definition out there, but this is how I like to put it.

Ebony Blue is special not only because of it’s gorgeous deep blue/black/teal colour, but also it’s amazing red sheen. I had no idea there was sheen when I purchased the ink and didn’t even notice it until a month into using it. I was using it in a fine nib, so it wasn’t as apparent. I was sitting in class with the afternoon sun shining through the window behind me when I seen it. A beautiful red coming from my accounting notes. I was so excited when I seen this that I went online to tell everyone what I discovered, only to find out that this was a well known fact with a simple google search. That was fine. After knowing this, I put it in a wetter pen and was mesmerized every time I could see this amazing red sheen.

Just take a look at how amazing the red sheen goes with Ebony Blue, how can this not be your favourite!

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Just look at that sheen

The Bad

As much as I love this ink, it is not perfect. Thankfully the negatives are limited to just one. What can this nearly perfect ink have wrong with it you may ask? Well it smears quite easily, sometimes days after it has dried. I am not going to blame the ink 100% since I have fairly sweaty hands, but it happens more with Ebony Blue than other inks that I own.

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Some smearing after a day

Final Thoughts

I think it is obvious that I love this ink, even with the annoying smearing. This is just my opinion of course, but I definitely recommend that you try a sample for yourself! A few similar inks that I have tried are Noodler’s Air Corp Blue Black, which is a bit darker, and Sailor Yama Dori which is lighter than Ebony Blue, but shares that amazing red sheen.

[Ghost Plane]

R&K's Verdigris falls into this family, too. Loved EB for years.

 

On a totally unrelated note, I'm trying to figure out why the auto-error on my iPad changed EB to Arab. ?????

[Frank C]

Thanks for the review. Some of those Private Reserve inks seem never to dry.

[amberleadavis]

Thank you.

[Drawing61]

Thanks. I just discovered Ebony Blue a few weeks ago and it has become my daily writing ink, for now.

[jasonchickerson]

Great review! I too love the color of Ebony Blue. However, it is too wet for my pens (like gushing, if I remember correctly) and the dry time is terrible.

 

I also love the color of R&K Verdegris. Though, with that one, the fatal flaw is a complete disappearing act at high humidity. Seriously, Verdegris will erase without a trace with a tiny amount of water.

[A144]

Thanks for the review. I really like the color of this ink. Although my experience with Ebony Purple makes me hesitant to try another of the Ebony series. It smears like that's what it was designed to do, and it seems Ebony Blue does as well.

 

I agree with what others have said about R&K Verdigris; if you like this color spectrum you should give it a try.