Pelikan Edelstein Golden Lapis

[namrehsnoom]

Pelikan Edelstein Golden Lapis
Ink of the Year 2024

 

In 2011 Pelikan introduced the Edelstein series of high-end inks, available in a variety of colours. The theme of the Edelstein concept is the gemstone – each ink corresponds to the beautiful colour of a gem. The Edelstein line of inks is presented in 50 ml high-value bottles, that are truly beautiful, and worthy of a place on your desk.

 

In this review the spotlight shines on the shimmering presence of Golden Lapis, the Edelstein Ink of the Year 2024. This is a limited edition glitter ink, that will most probably be gone in the near future.  At heart, Golden Lapis is a bright light-blue ink with added golden shimmer particles. I’m not a fan of shine & shimmer, so will mostly ignore this aspect of the ink. Just one word of warning: the gold particles tend to accumulate at the surface, and will easily come off the paper when the ink has dried. It’s almost unavoidable. 

The ink’s colour is quite enjoyable. My first thought was: “Oh, this is Topaz with shimmer”. But that’s not really the case. Topaz is a lighter turquoise blue, while this Golden Lapis definitely is a touch darker. Still a light & bright blue though. Most Edelstein inks work well across the nib size range, and can handle all types of paper. This one is a bit more finicky. It mostly has problems with absorbent paper: the ink gets sucked right in and through the paper, with bleed-through as a result. Yikes! On hard-surface coated paper, the ink looks great, but it needs its time to dry… for a long time. In return, you get strong and truly nice shading, and a bit of a purple-reddish sheen. Overall, a good-looking ink with some technical issues.

The chromatography shows a light-blue dye with some purple component in the mix that darkens up the ink a bit. Water resistance is fairly good: although a good deal of the dyes are washed away, enough is left to easily reconstruct your writing. Not bad.

 

Golden Lapis writes well in all nib sizes. A nicely lubricated and well-saturated ink that always leaves a strong and contrast-rich line on the paper. I like it best with the broader nibs, where the shading really comes into play. I’m not usually a big fan of heavy shading, but for this ink I make an exception. Golden Lapis looks at its best when the shading is strongest – the contrast between light and darker parts is really well balanced, and looks just darn good. But you only get this lovely  and aesthetically pleasing shading on the hard-surface paper. On absorbent paper, shading is just barely there and the ink loses much of its appeal. 

 

To show you the impact of saturation on the ink’s look & feel on paper, I made some scribbles where I really saturated portions of a piece of 52 gsm Tomoe River paper with ink. This gives you a good idea of what the ink is capable of in terms of colour range. Golden Lapis has a medium colour span, gradually darkening as saturation increases, but always keeping true to its light-blue nature. The light-to-dark ratio in writing is just right, with really great aesthetics. You get prominent shading, not too extreme, which looks absolutely gorgeous – but only on the hard-surface paper.

 

Technically, the ink has the typical Edelstein feel: well lubricated, good saturation. It’s a shame it doesn’t work well with absorbent paper, and that includes all types of copy paper. The ink then gets sucked into and through the paper, making a mess of the opposite side. For some reason, it also didn’t work well with the paper in my Paperblanks journal, which usually is not that fussy about the inks I use. Looks like the Paperblanks paper is just a touch too absorbent to work well with this ink.

Below you’ll find photos of the writing samples on loads of different paper types. This should give you a good feel for the ink. On each scrap of paper I show you:

• An ink swab, made with a cotton Q-tip
• 1-2-3 pass swab, to show increasing saturation
• An ink scribble made with an M-nib Safari fountain pen
• The name of the paper used, written with a B-nib Safari
• A small text sample, written with the M-nib Safari
• Title of the quote, with a Pelikan M120 with M-nib
• Drying times of the ink on the paper, with the M-nib Lamy Safari

 

I’ve also added a scan of some writing samples to give you another view on the ink. Scanned images and photos often capture different aspects of the ink’s colour & contrast. That’s why I present them both. The ink swabs look closest in colour in the scanned image. The character of writing shows best in the photos.

 

Below you also find some blow-ups on coated paper to really show you that beautiful shading. 

 

Writing with different nib sizes
The picture below shows the effect of nib sizes on the writing. The top samples were written with a Lamy Safari, which is typically a dry pen. I also added a few visiting pens. What is really visible here is the wide range of blue hues the ink produces in the different pens & nib sizes. That’s quite some variety for a single ink. Cool!

 

Related inks
To show off related inks, I use my nine-grid format, with the currently reviewed ink at the center. This format shows the name of related inks, a saturation sample, a 1-2-3 swab and a water resistance test – all in a very compact format. Golden Lapis’ base colour is fairly similar to several other inks. Iroshizuku kon-peki comes close, but is a tad lighter. In the Pelikan Edelstein line-up, Topaz would be my alternative of choice. It’s technically a better ink, and looks amazing on any type of paper. 

 

Inkxperiment – Pythagoras
I’ve put myself a challenge to try to produce interesting drawings using only the ink I’m reviewing.  I find this to be a fun extension of the hobby, and have found these single-ink drawings ideal for experimenting with different techniques. And creating these monochrome paintings is simply fun, and always good for a couple of hours well spent. 

Inspiration for this inkxperiment comes from the world of mathematics. Recently I came across an article on the internal structure of protons, which captured my attention. So I grabbed a book on particle physics, and on page 10 or so I got lost in the math... a bit embarrassing 😉. So I’m refreshing my math now, starting from the basics. And right there at the very beginning is that Greek philosopher genius of about 2500 years ago who had that great insight into the geometry of triangles. I tried to capture his wisdom into this little inkxperiment.

 

I started with an A4 sheet of 300 gsm watercolour paper, and painted in the temple background, using Golden Lapis with multiple water/ink ratios. I then used pure ink and lots of glitter to frame the sky. Next I added the visualization of the Pythagorean theorem, and our philosopher sitting at the temple wall. The end-result gives you an idea of what can be achieved with Golden Lapis as a drawing ink.

 

Inkxpired – computational art
I love experimenting with pen/ink/paper and have added another layer as part of the hobby. I’m exploring computational art, inspired by the ink drawings I do during ink reviews. Another fun offshoot of the hobby… and all that starting with a few drops of dye-coloured water on paper.

 

I started by using a duo-tone colour filter and added a graph paper backdrop. I then used a “tiny world” filter with focus on our philosopher. Next I used a grid-filter which also added colour to the image. The end result shows the mathematical lens through which Pythagoras viewed the world.

 

Conclusion
With this Ink of the Year, Pelikan continues to present us with a shimmer ink (please stop doing that 😉). This time with a nice bright-blue base colour that looks gorgeous on hard-surface, good-quality paper. Unfortunately, the ink suffers badly when using it on absorbent paper, with loss of shading and quite some see-through and bleed-through. A nice enough ink to try, but not one that falls in the must-have category (my opinion).

 

Technical test results on Rhodia N° 16 notepad paper, written with Lamy Safari, M-nib

 

Backside of writing samples on different paper types
 

 

[lapis]

Nice -- i.e. very informative but also artfully crafted --  review! Also the innumerate cast of colour comparisons. I like this colour as it's an interesting and not all that ordinary blue. But at the same time I'm up to this date sad that I no longer have access to the many high-power centrifuges I once had in the lab. Oh well, maybe the flakes will fall out if I'm gentle enough....

[yazeh]

Thank you for such a detailed review. @namrehsnoom, I especially loved the artwork, in both forms.

It's truly gorgeous and that gold shimmer brings the oomph the ink needs

 

I found it intriguing that in the page with different nibs, the inks leans teal, whereas in the samples above, it's blue. I'm assuming the colour is more Kon-peki than teal leaning, am I right?

[InesF]

Thank you, @namrehsnoom, for introducing Golden Lapis to us in such a comprehensive and entertaining way!  Always a pleasure to read through your reviews. The ink looks for me best from your Safari M nib writing example.

 

I'm also a bit surprised that Golden Lapis is not Topaz with glitter. However, the difference seems to be in intensity not so much in hue - maybe because of lower surface tension? I didn't buy Golden Lapis, because I do not like glitter in writing inks; I use such inks only for calligraphy.

 

I adore your artwork; the original drawing is great but the distortion makes it an exceptional and stunning piece! Well done! 

[Bo Bo Olson]

A grand review. Especially with so many papers, and a good view of nib widths.

 

Oh, I discovered if one waits about 30 seconds after shaking the bottle and filling from the bottom of the bottle I got the Golden Sands many had gotten.....filling from the top of a just well shaken bottle gave little but tilt glitter.

In I had filled a medium-small Osmia 62, semi-flex OB, I didn't get any shading. I will try this ink on an drier springy regular flex M, nib. A B in that flex rate, if a Pelikan may still be too wet.

In my to clean cup I have a Cross Townsend in that flex rate and size.

Pen, rubber bulb syringe in hand, off to clean that pen.

It cleaned out faster than any pen that I can remember. Under 5 minutes including converter.

But it has to wait  for the last to wick off the feed onto the paper towel.

[RedPie]

Thank you for that wonderful review. So many papers... and nice artwork. I can't wait to use that ink now! 

[Bo Bo Olson]

Remember shake to fill, from a settling cloud of glitter from the bottom of the bottle.

I'm bringing out my Cross Townsend springy regular flex M, looking for the shading I saw in the OP's grand review.

I have it in a medium-small Osmia mdl 62 with an OB semi-flex steel nib. With Osmia; a steel nib is as grand as their grand gold nibs, and better or at least as good as anyone else's nib be it gold or steel.

Geha's gold nibs were also made by Degussa.......the Geha student pen was made to match the Pelikan 120 (both were springy regular flex), so is not a semi-flex like Osmia or most of the Geha piston pens. A passed English pal wanted my steel Degussa made Geha nib that was semi-flex, like the Osmia nibs.

.....................

Printing makes so much nicer shading than writing....as I did on some of the papers mentioned.....when I went back and printed I too had better shading.

 

It's way too bad I can't afford the books quoted, inks, pens, an occasion  paper sspree.

I was totally shocked used paper backs cost over $15.00 now, on the net. I wanted to rebuy R. A. MacAvoy's, The Book of Kells that was never returned to me.

The world has really gone to hell when used books cost near as much as new.

[RedPie]

12 minutes ago, Bo Bo Olson said:

Remember shake to fill, from a settling cloud of glitter from the bottom of the bottle.

Thank you @Bo Bo Olson. I will use it in one of my Pelikans to start with. 😊

[Bo Bo Olson]

Just did the same my self. M is much less glitter than OBB.

With M glitter is an add on...with OBB it is put on your high hiking boots.

[senzen]

Great review; Golden Lapis looks really nice on my screen at least, but already having Ama Iro, Kon Peki and Topaz this might be over the top.

[Bo Bo Olson]

23 minutes ago, senzen said:

Kon Peki and Topaz

I have both, and Golden Lapis, depends on how glittery you want it and how wide the nib is....and the paper.

 

I didn't, and still don't think of the three being all that close. As thought, Kon Piki is darker. Topaz not as dark as kon-piki and Pelikan Golden Lapis depending on the paper a touch towards turquoise in a M, but is a darker duller tone of blue with a OB semi-flex.

[lgsoltek]

I really like the base colour, but I'm still hesitant with shimmers... Especially given the rather bad experience with Golden Beryl. Hmm...

[LizEF]

Sorry I'm late to the party!   (I was fictionally dysfunctional yesterday, finishing book 2 of a trilogy; and will be fictionally dysfunctional again immediately after posting this, until I've finished book 3. )

 

Most of the images of the ink color say it's not my kind of color, though some look interesting.  But the artwork!!  Whoa, @namrehsnoom, you've outdone yourself!   I love both versions, and I really love how you put the glitter to use (thereby getting a ton of it out of the bottle )  Thank you for another thorough and beautiful review!

[Bo Bo Olson]

10 hours ago, lgsoltek said:

Especially given the rather bad experience with Golden Beryl.

What happened?

 

That was an ink too light for me, so I didn't pay attention.

 

Diamine Arctic Blue got me back into glitter inks...in that one glitters from a top filled bottle.

I've a slew...5-7 ink to try before I can dig out my old Diamine glitter inks** that were then to me a disappointment.

But since then I discovered, shake well, let settle back out  for 30 seconds or more, and fill from the bottom, which gave me Golden Sands with Golden Lapis....I saw elsewhere.

 

**perhaps we can get to a flea market and I can get at my second ink storage box. Once a month, I'd go to that ink box....since it was blocked, once every three or four days, I read something on the com that wants a hidden ink..................

[senzen]

On 9/2/2024 at 2:24 PM, Bo Bo Olson said:

I have both, and Golden Lapis, depends on how glittery you want it and how wide the nib is....and the paper.

 

I didn't, and still don't think of the three being all that close. As thought, Kon Piki is darker. Topaz not as dark as kon-piki and Pelikan Golden Lapis depending on the paper a touch towards turquoise in a M, but is a darker duller tone of blue with a OB semi-flex.

 

Thanks! I have little interest in shimmer, use mostly HP 32, Kokuyo 64, TR 52, Clairefontaine notebooks.

 

My one shimmery ink, Rouge Hematite produces little shimmer on these papers, although I did put a drop of White Lightning in it to tame the crud.

[Bo Bo Olson]

I have more interest now that I found out the trick, shake well, wait at least 30 seconds and fill from the bottom of the cloud.

If I want just a little bit, fill from the top of the bottle, and balance how long ago it was well shaken.

[jmccarty3]

If you don't like glitter (my pronouns are he, him, his), can you just wait for it to settle, then pipette some off the top, or is it necessary to filter the ink to get rid of the pixie dust? I ask because I came away from the Hub with two bottles of the stuff.

 

(I know, as a dude I should be writing with a darker blue, but dark blues like Noodler's Anti-Fascist come out of all my pens as black, while lighter blues like Iro Tsuyu-kusa come out as dark blues. This is a mystery that I wish someone would solve.)

[LizEF]

36 minutes ago, jmccarty3 said:

but dark blues like Noodler's Anti-Fascist come out of all my pens as black, while lighter blues like Iro Tsuyu-kusa come out as dark blues. This is a mystery that I wish someone would solve.

This suggests your pens are wet.  What nib size, if I may ask?  In my reviews of inks with a Japanese EF nib, I've found that some inks go very pale, some very dark, and others are roughly what you would expect.  When inks go darker, it's generally a wet ink, possibly in a wet pen.  FWIW.

[Bo Bo Olson]

That fill low trick didn't work on Diamine Brandy Dazzle or Tropical Glow.

 

[JohnEbach]

I just opened mu bottle of Golden Lapis and filled my TWSBI 580 with a 1.1 nib. I shook the ink well and filled from top to middle.  The first sentence was heavy gold glitter and then less and by the 3rd line the ink quit flowing totally.  I had to get a wet paper towel and draw the nib across which at first didn't do a thing until after several tries the gold and blue were showing up a lot.  I finally got the ink to flow and tried to write again.  It wrote for a while and then back to dry.  Not sure what might be happening here.  I tried the wet paper towel trick but had no real luck getting it to start.  I was wondering if others had had the issue with the Golden Lapis ink.  I may have to fill again with a shake t get it mixed and then fill from the top to get less gold?