Diamine Earl Grey (30ml for $7.50) is probably my favorite grey ink. Anyone present at last week’s Patreon-only meet-up wouldn’t believe me because I unceremoniously spilled the entirety of the bottle off my desk onto the floor. Trust me when I say I was doing my tired floors a favor. The floors now have a lovely Jackson Pollock-spattered treatment to them that at least give them character which is more than they had before. At least it was a good ink color!
Diamine Earl Grey is similar to Sailor Jentle Chu-Shu in that both these inks are a cool, purply grey though Earl Grey is ever so slightly darker. What I would give if Diamine would scent Earl Grey with a little bergamot so it actually smelled like a delicious cup of tea!
I confess that, in writing, Earl Grey is cooler grey than what actual Earl Grey tea looks like but I will forgive Diamine their creative liberties because this ink is such a lovely grey color. Is it too much to ask for Diamine, a UK-based ink company, to actually mix an ink that looks like English Breaky, Builder’s Brew or Darjeeling? Embrace your Englishness, Diamine, give us your pinky’s-up most-tea-ish tea colors! Please?!?!
Regardless of the lack of genuine tea-like color, Earl Grey is still a favorite, even after it stained my hands for three days. The ink has a great range of shading from deep grey to pale lavender. No sheening though.
On both Rhodia and Tomoe River paper, Earl Grey gives a full range of shading, dries in a reasonable amount of time. Diamine Earl Grey is a more cost effective option than Sailor Chu-Shu and available in the smaller 30ml bottles as well as the massive 80ml tankards that are still cheaper than the 50ml bottles from Sailor.
Tools:
- Paper: Rhodia Uni-Blank No. 16 with 6mm guide sheet and Elia Notebook with 68gsm Tomoe River paper (RM145.00 MYR)
- Pens: Midori bullet pencil modified dip nib holder with Zebra G titanium nib ($33.50 per 10-pack), Acrylic dip nib pen (Approx. $15), Pensive Pens Serendipity hybrid dip pen ($79 AUD)
- Swatches: Col-o-Ring Ink Testing Book ($10) & Col-o-dex Rotary Cards ($15)
- Brush: Scharff 3000 Fineline Round #3 ($34.50 — my favorite paintbrush)
- Ink: Diamine Earl Grey ($7.50 for 30ml bottle)
Absolutely my favorite grey ink and one of my favorite inks overall! Earl Grey is also one of my favorite teas — in fact, I’m drinking a cup of it right now. 🙂
Early Grey was a r/fountainpen created color so it’s not too surprising that the name/color don’t really match. Still, this is one of my favorite grey inks. Soft enough to not be black, but dark enough to not be faded.
It is a really great color. It was one of the first full bottles I ever purchased.