A year and a half ago I wrote about my then collection of 637 Bottles and 33.47 Litres of Ink and now, after cracking 1,000 thanks to my recent purchase of all 100 Sailor Ink Studio inks (from Pen Classics) I thought was a good time to give an update to the collection.
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Ink Review: Robert Oster Orange Rumble
in Ink Review
Orange Rumble is a relatively new addition to the Robert Oster lineup. It looked nice when I first saw photos of the ink from Rob, but upon seeing it in person I was very impressed! Rob describes the ink as a 1970's inspired ink. I can see where this is coming from; browns, burnt oranges, yellow-greens are certainly some popular 70s colours schemes!
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637 Bottles and 33.47 litres of Ink
It took a while but I finally cleaned the space around my ink shelf and and arranged the bottles somewhat to take a photo of the entire collection. The title is a bit untrue because as of these photos, 619 bottles of ink were on the shelf (well, one I forgot was on my desk) but I have 18 bottles of ink that are on the way as well making for a total of 637 bottles (593 if you discount the 44 duplicated). That's around 33.47 litres (8.84 gallons) of ink. I have an additional 99 samples and swatches of 165 inks that I have neither bottles nor samples of. In total I have 858 swatches of unique inks.
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Ink Comparison: Parker Penman Emerald
In November last year I did a comparison of Parker Penman Sapphire an ink that a few other ink makers had either tried to copy or drew inspiration from. Parker Penman Emerald only has Bungubox Norwegian Wood (or Bungubox Emerald) that drew inspiration from it. Penman Emerald is the perfect green for me. I'm not a huge fan of greens in general (and generally avoid greens that lean blue) and this is the perfect, for me, balance of yellow and blue; it's slightly on the yellow side. It's got some sheen and shading which are other characteristics I am drawn to. Like the rest of the Parker Penman ink series, it was discontinued in 2000 which is around 17 years ago as of this comparison.
To avoid confusion, although Bungubox Emerald is probably the inks most well-known name I will be using its alternate name 'Norwegian Wood' to distinguish it from Parker Penman Emerald
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Ink Comparison: Oranges
These are by no means all my orange inks, but I think they are a pretty decent and interesting set of ten. I have three Sailor oranges, as well as some other well regarded inks. These are swatched and written with a glass dip pen. I have not inked these for this comparison. The inks are: Bookbinder's Online Everglades Ratsnake, Robert Oster Orange, Diamine Marigold, Robert Oster Peach, Sailor Kobe #25 Tarumi Apricot, Bungubox Fresh Orange Mandarin/Tangarine (among other names), Sailor Apricot, Sailor Kin-Mokusei, Noodler's Apache Sunset, and Caran d'Ache Saffron.
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