Earlier in October, I kicked off the first review of a new ink line (at least to the Well-Appointed Desk group!), Van Dieman’s. These inks come from far away Australia with colors that are inspired by various aspects of the region.
There are so many inks from Van Dieman’s! Ana and I have split the inks between us for review, but there are still a large number. Luckily, there are several series within the overall ink lineup including the Seasons Series and the Wilderness Series. Today I will go over the Wilderness Series. Thank you so much to Vanness for sending the large number of ink samples for this review!
Van Dieman’s Wilderness Series is a group of 10 inks: Devil’s Kitchen, Huon Pine, Eucalyptus Regnans, Hanging Lake, Hastings Caves, Azure Kingfisher, Federation Peak, Spotted Sun Orchid, Firetail Finch, and Black Tongue Spider Orchid. I was not able to include a swatch of the Black Tongue Spider Orchid – Vanness was out of stock on this ink. But the other nine are shown here and you can see the swatch from their site below.
First for the greens in the Wilderness Series: Devil’s Kitchen (more of a teal actually), Huon Pine, and Eucalyptus Regnans. I have had the Eucalyptus ink in a pen at all times since I received the sample.
The Blues and Purples are shown below (along with a photo of the swatch of the Black Tongue Spider Orchid, courtesy of the Vanness website) including Azure Kingfisher (a shimmer ink), Hanging Lake, and Spotted Sun Orchid. Spotted Sun Orchid is my favorite of the entire Wilderness Series inks – I mean, purple. What’s not to love?
The remaining three inks in the line are the red Firetail Finch, Hastings Caves (a shimmer ink), and Federation Peak. Hastings Caves contains lots of shimmer – my sample seemed to be about 1 part shimmer to 2 parts ink. But it is amazing on paper!
The whole series together makes a colorful line!
Other than the two shimmer inks (Azure Kingfisher and Hastings Caves), the inks are a bit on the wet side of normal for flow (not lubricated), do not bleed through or feather on fountain pen friendly paper (Tomoe River paper, old), are are each very easy to clean out of pens. The shimmer inks are beautiful and very heavy with shimmer. I would only use these inks in pens that could be completely cleaned out (no piston fillers or sac fillers) and with wider nibs in order to allow the ink and shimmer to flow. Even better would be the use of dip pens or a folded nib.
The entire Van Dieman’s ink line is available at Vanness1938.com at $12.95 for a 30mL bottle.
- Swatch Cards: Col-o-ring cards (100 for $10)
- Ink: Van Dieman’s the Wilderness Series ($12.95 for 30mL or $2.50 for 4mL sample)
DISCLAIMER: The inks in this review were provided free for the purpose of reviewing including the Col-o-rings which are provided to me by Ana because she knows she can keep me writing all the time in exchange for the wonderful cards. Please see the About page for more details.
Hi, Jessica!
Nice review os the whole series! It's nice to see all the colors together. I've been going through a lot pf the Eucalyptus, though mine's darker than the swatch you have. I'm not sure if it's the lighting or just the differences. in batches. I find it a very satisfying colour.I hope you can get a sample of the Spider Orchid. I'd like to see how that one looks outside laboratory conditions.
Stay safe!
Ruth