In Ink Review

12 Days of Inkmas: Day 2 – Robert Oster Astorquiza Rot

Author AnaPosted on 1 Comment

Inkmas 2019

Review by Laura Cameron

On the second day of Inkmas, my true love gave to me…

This Christmas I was looking for a rich red to use when addressing my Christmas cards. Spoiler alert: this isn’t it. (It’s still lovely! Keep reading!)

I ordered a sample of Robert Oster Astorquiza Rot (4mL, $2.50)  to audition the ink. While this isn’t my perfect Christmas ink, this is a beautiful brick or blood red. The ink goes down quite red in larger quantities, as you can see on the Col-O-Dex card below.

But coming out of the nib, or in writing, as it dries the ink takes on a decidedly browner tone. When I took a quick sprint through my samples, I found it most closely echoes Birmingham Studio Duquesne Incline Station Red and Mont Blanc William Shakespeare which are both appear as browner reds to me.

Despite not being exactly what I was looking for, I kinda dig this shade so I’ll happily add it to the collection!

DISCLAIMER: Some of the items included in this review were provided to us free of charge for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

In Ink Review

12 Days of Inkmas: Day 1 – TWSBI 1791 Part 1: Pink and Prairie Green

Author AnaPosted on 5 Comments
12 Days of Inkmas: Day 1 – TWSBI 1791 Part 1: Pink and Prairie Green

Welcome to the first day of Inkmas! We are celebrating the impending holiday with 12 Days of ink reviews — a somewhat annual tradition here at the Desk. We are going to start off with Tina’s reviews of the new TWSBI inks so really, you’re going to get way more in the next 12 Days than just 12 ink reviews.

Enjoy, stay warm (or cool depending on your hemisphere) and happy Inkmas to all and to all a good ink!

TWSBI closed box

TWSBI, the Taiwanese company known for its affordable, stylish fountain pens, will soon be known for inks with the debut of a limited-edition, six-color set in time for the holidays (six 18 ml bottles for $36; individual bottles also available for $7.50 each). The 1791 series is “inspired by the vivid scenes described in Cao Xueqin’s Dream of the Red Chamber. First printed in 1791, the novel is widely lauded as one of the greatest works in the history of Chinese literature.”

As part of this year’s 12 Days of Inkmas, I’m going to review them two at a time. This post will serve as an introduction to the boxed set and review of Pink and Prairie Green.

Packed in a sturdy carton with nicely rounded corners, the set would make a lovely gift for an ink-collecting friend or someone new to fountain pens. A diecut on the bellyband shows the TWSBI logo, which also appears on each faceted bottle lid. My favorite part of the design is the frosted glass – a distinctive touch among fountain pen inks.

TWSBI bottle tops TWSBI bottle top detail

 

TWSBI bottlesOn to the review of Pink and Prairie Green.

TWSBI Pink and Prairie Green

TWSBI Pink is a pure, lovely rose that is neither too orange nor too blue. I see no sheening, and it’s a little too pale to show shading. This pink evokes peonies and the centers of cherry blossoms. I forgot to test for water-solubility until after I photographed the swatches, but none of the TWSBI inks is in any way waterproof. All washed richly with a swipe of water.

TWSBI Pink

Sampled with the fine Zebra G nib, the pink looked a bit pale for writing, so I tried it in my medium-nib Lamy Nexx. I like it better here, and it would probably be best with an even broader nib.

Lamy Nexx with pink

Closest in my collection to TWSBI’s Pink is Iroshizuku Kosumosu, though the latter leans more toward the coral side. Iroshizuku Momiji is more saturated and bluer.

Pink comparison

Prairie Green might be my favorite in the set – a vibrant yellow-green of young leaves. Like Pink, Prairie Green sits squarely in the leaf green range without being too yellow nor too blue. Again, I don’t see signs of sheening.

TWSBI Prairie Green

It turns out l like this green because I found several others in my collection that come close. Caran d’Ache Chromatics Delicate Green is the most similar. Others are close but tend slightly toward either olive or yellow.

Prairie Green comparison

TWSBI Prairie Green struck me as a beautiful color to paint/draw with, so I filled a waterbrush with it.

TWSBI Prairie Green in waterbrush

At Gage Academy’s annual Drawing Jam event in Seattle, both nude and costumed models pose for short and long durations all day. For this five-minute pose, I used the Prairie Green-filled brush to make the initial gesture strokes. Then I used a hacked Pilot Parallel filled with TWSBI Sky Blue (coming up in Part 2) to emphasize the shading. They’re beautiful inks to draw with!

waterbrush and Parallel sketch

TOOLS

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided free of charge by JetPens for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

tina-koyama

Tina Koyama is an urban sketcher in Seattle. Her blog is Fueled by Clouds & Coffee, and you can follow her on Instagram as Miatagrrl.

Updated: 12/18/19 to add link to the Gage Drawing Jam.

In Paper Review

Notebook Preview: Baron Fig New York City Softcover Notebooks

Author AnaPosted on
Notebook Preview: Baron Fig New York City Softcover Notebooks

The latest limited edition from Baron Fig are the New York City Softcover Notebooks ($16) which feature three distinctly illustrated covers by illustrator Josh Cochran of city life. As someone who dwells in a considerably less urban environment than New York these days, I wasn’t sure if the latest edition would resonate with me or just make me homesick for city life.

Baron Fig NYC edition

 

One cover illustrates people on the daily commute on the train, another folks on the beach and the third out walking in the park. As a former Chicagoan, these scenes could easily be the L, the North Ave Beach and along Lakeshore Drive. I’m sure folks in other cities can substitute their own rail system (if you are lucky enough to have one), your favorite spot to lie in the sun and the best place to take a walk (be it park or parkway). So, the books give me a little bit of nostalgia for my hometown but also for warmer days as we all bundle up like sherpas for the blustery winter ahead.

Baron Fig NYC edition

Inside, the “Flagship” medium size softcover notebooks provide the same features we love about Baron Fig’s products already: 72pages of sewn bound 90gsm paper with 5mm dot grid and lovely rounded corners.

The Baron Fig medium still features their own unique dimensions at 5.4″x7.7″ (137mmx195mm). To compare, a standard A5 size is 148x210mm. A Baron Fig medium notebook will fit into a notebook cover designed for A5 sized notebooks but there will be excess space.

The NYC edition is an aesthetic treat and I love that Baron Fig is doing different things with their special edition notebooks than what Field Notes does. The original illustrations are a refreshing change and let Baron Fig shine on their own.

In feature, Ink Review

Ink Review: Kyo-no-oto Sakuranezumi

Author Jessica ColesPosted on 6 Comments
Ink Review: Kyo-no-oto Sakuranezumi

By Jessica Coles

Kyo-no-oto is an ink line from the TAG stationery store in Japan with colors designed to represent traditional Japanese dyes. The latest release from Kyo-no-oto is Sakuranezumi or Cherry Blossom Mouse (maybe the cutest name ever).

From the box, the color seems to be a dusty pinkish purple that shades well. The box is a thick cardstock with the name Kyo-no-oto letterpressed into the material and is one of those boxes that I can never seem to open without a small tear in one corner.

Opening the bottle, the ink seems to be a very dark purple and on the thin side – very little ink stayed on the inside of the lid.

Sakuranezumi is an amazing shading ink. On my swatch card, the shading varies from a dusty rose to a plum with a dark halo and a hint of a goldish-green sheen on tthe edges of that halo.

In very heavy applications, Sakuranezumi can even move towards a violet. This only happened where I allowed a LOT of ink to dry.

As I compared Sakuranezumi to other inks, there was a wide range to match. The lightest areas seemed to be a good match to Robert Oster Claret while the heavier applications looked near the lightest portions of Bungubox Ink of the Witch.

Due to the sakura portion of the name, I was inspired to draw a few flowers. The shading is great here, just don’t judge the quality of the actual drawing!

Another large swatch of ink shows again the leaning towards blue undertones.

The biggest complaint about Kyo-no-oto ink is that the inks are terribly dry. I used a pen that is normally too wet for my taste in order to compensate for the dryness and I was pleased with the results! The flow seemed perfect. I would label Sakuranezumi as a dry-ish ink, although nowhere near the dryness level of Stone Road or Hisoku.

 

 

Wide nibs and script writing (rather than cursive) show the shading very well. In writing I would actually say Sakuranezumi is a medium shading ink.

At $28 for 40mL, Kyo-no-oto inks are on the pricy side, but, in my opinion, are worth the price for the original colors. Now I need to find a stuffed Cherry Blossom Mouse for my desk!

 

Tools:

DISCLAIMER: All materials used in this review were purchased by me. Please see the About page for more details.

In Link Love

Link Love: December Reflections

Author AnaPosted on
Link Love: December Reflections

This week, the lists (year end, gift guides and favorites) are more predominant than in past weeks.  There’s the Pen Addict’s Stationery Products of the Decade, Pencilcaseblog’s Holiday Gift Guide, plus some creativity classes from My Modern Met and more.

December is a good time to plan, reflect and take time to think about how the past year (or years) have been and plan for the future. Certainly, we can pause and reflect anytime and hit our own personal reset button but the new year on the horizon always creates a natural reflection point.

2020 will ring in the tenth year of The Well-Appointed Desk and I’m ready to reflect, celebrate and reminisce. Are you planning to “reset” for 2020?

Pens:

Ink:

Pencils:

Notebooks & Paper:

Art & Creativity:

Other Interesting Things:

In feature, Paper Review

Notebook and Cover Review & Giveaway: BB7B B5 Binder

Author Laura CameronPosted on 35 Comments

Review by Laura Cameron

A few months ago, the Desk was contacted by BB7B, a relatively new company whose mission is specializing in premium stationery and accessories. From the company website:

The name BB7B is text message shorthand for the traditional Irish language sign-off in a letter to a friend or colleague: Beir Bua agus Beannacht, which means I hope you are blessed with great success.

BB7B’s innaugural product is a B5 Binder in a dark green color (normally $45, now on sale for the holidays for $19.99).

The binder itself is hardcover, covered with dark green book cloth. It has been designed with a lay-flat spine that is rounded. The front cover is completely plain. Inside the front cover is a grey cardstock envelope approximately 3/8″ (1 cm) thick that can hold miscellaneous items up to and including a phone or small tablet.  There is a dark green elastic band that holds the grey envelope shut.

 

On the opposite side of the binder, there is a B5 sized notepad (6.9 x 9.8″ or 176 x 250 mm excluding the margin), perforated for ease of use, and two-hole punched and held in place by a metal band and two screws. The back cover is embossed with the BB7B logo, and has a light gray colored elastic band to hold the notebook pages in place.

Overall the B5 binder is somewhat bulky. It measures 8.7 x 10″ (220 x 270 mm) and is approximately 1″ (25 mm) thick. With the notebook in place, the full weight comes to about 1lb 1oz (~675 grams) so this isn’t going to be a lightweight EDC.

My feelings about this product are mixed. First, the binder. While advertised as “subtle, stylish, professional,” the binder doesn’t have the clean lines and luxury feel that I had hoped for. The hardcover feels like cardboard which I worry wouldn’t stand up to wear and tear, and I also wonder if the book cloth will fray over time. While I like the inner envelope quite a bit, I don’t feel like the card stock is sturdy enough that I’d want to put my iPad in there safely. I do see it being excellent for storing business cards, post-its, handouts from meetings, etc.

To me, the true hidden gem of this product is the notepad inside! The ivory paper is 100gsm and features light gray dot grid. Originally I wasn’t sure that the paper would be fountain pen quality, but it is and I REALLY enjoyed writing on it. It’s smooth and crisp, and I didn’t have any bleeding or feathering. There’s barely even any show-through on the back side! While I wasn’t entirely impressed with the quality of the binder, the paper is more than I was expecting.

Underneath the notepad there is a note that you can reorder paper from BB7B. That item isn’t available on the website so I reached out to our contact to see what the story is. They are expecting to have the notepad available on the website any day now (darn that manufacturing process!) but they also advise that any B5 size notepad will work and the gap between the holes is the same as any standard two hole punch.

Overall, I have some ideas for how the B5 binder could play into my life. It’s not going in my bag or getting transported as a part of my EDC. I suspect I’ll use it for a specific purpose like my meal planning. I think the paper will be perfect for notes, recipes, ideas, etc. and the envelope will hold all the bits and pieces of that: coupons, recipes from magazines and papers, spare recipes cards, etc.

Now, onto the GIVEAWAY.

BB7B has generously sent me B5 binders for for TWO lucky readers to try!

TO ENTER: Leave a comment below and tell me how you think you’d use your B5 binder! It makes reading through entries more interesting for me, okay? One entry per person.

If you have never entered a giveaway or commented on the site before, your comment must be manually approved by our highly-trained staff of monkeys before it will appear on the site. Our monkeys are underpaid and under-caffeinated so don’t stress if your comment does not appear right away. Give the monkeys some time.

FINE PRINT: All entries must be submitted by 10pm CST on Friday, December 13, 2019. All entries must be submitted at wellappointeddesk.com, not Twitter, Tumblr or Facebook, okay? Winner will be announced on Monday. Winner will be selected by random number generator from entries that played by the rules (see above). Please include your actual email address in the comment form so that I can contact you if you win. I will not save email addresses or sell them to anyone — pinky swear. If winner does not respond within 10 days, I will draw a new winner. Shipping via USPS first class/Prioirty Mail is covered. Additional shipping options or insurance will have to be paid by the winner. We are generous but we’re not made of money. US and APO/AFO only, sorry.

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review and giveaway were provided to us free of charge by BB7B for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.