Montblanc Beatles Psychedelic Purple

I am not much of a purple fan, honestly, but this color surprised me. I received a sample from one of my friends in our local pen group and I am quite taken by this color. I even went through all of my purple ink swabs and cannot find much close to it, from what I have available. Let's look at it.

 This is the latest Special Edition ink from Montblanc and I really enjoy the special bottle that this ink comes packaged in. It is a 50mL bottle and is listed at a whopping $43 here in the U.S.

 This is a very vibrant color and yes, I know I have misspelled the work psychedelic here in these swatches. We all make errors from time to time. There is some sheen seen on some paper but it needs to be applied liberally for it to show.

The ink itself is very well behaved and had no feathering, bleed or spread. It has nice flow and some decent shading when shown as it is a bit darker.

What I really enjoy is the way the ink remains constant no matter the paper being used.

Apica Paper

Franklin-Christoph Paper

Leuchtturm Paper

Rhodia Paper

Tomoe River Paper

The ink color is vibrant and actually is fun to write with. It reminds me of the infamous Noodler's Baystate Blue with how vibrant it can be.

I believe I need to purchase a bottle of this ink. This color has turned me into a purple lover, at least this particular purple. It is an expensive offering but 50mL is a good quantity and I do not have anything close to this shade of color.

This review is based off of my opinion and experiences. I do not represent Montblanc at all nor am I being compensated in any way.

Noodlers Ink - Luck of the Draw

Hello fellow fountain pen peoples. I was thrilled to get my hands on this ink which was made for the Baltimore Pen Show for 2018. As many of you know, I do love Noodler's ink. 

This color is quite intriguing. It is a muted dark green/grey color that does shade nicely and is water resistant. As with a lot of Noodler's inks, there is a story behind the color and label but Nathan Tardif has not disclosed it in this case. The label denotes 1850's Baltimore on the label so I took to doing some research.  What I found was interesting. It seems to be tied to pre-Cival War Baltimore, where the ruling party were Democrats and were primarily Catholic Irish. The working class was primarily German. The American Party (Know Nothing) came to power by using violence at the polls to keep Democratic voters from the polls. The American Party began to try to upgrade the water system and professionalize Police and Firefighters, which are noble endeavors. The Irish and Germans revolted and brought the American Party down. 

I may be off base, but to me, the ink color matches that assessment.

Ok, let's talk the ink itself. 

Rhodia Paper

It is a nice dark green grey color. It really swabs out to more of a muted color but the writing actually has some nice shading elements and some decent saturation. 

Tomoe River Paper

Apica Paper

Franklin-Christoph Paper

Leuchtturm Paper

Some papers tested bring out more of the grey aspects of the color and others have a nice blend of the green and grey. The Tomoe River really was my favorite looking of the tests. 

The ink behaves nicely from the tests shown. I did not see any bleeding, feathering or spread and the flow is moderate to wet. 

I wanted to see if I had any oddly colored green inks to try to compare to this one and Franklin-Christoph Loden is the closest. 

KWZ Rotten Green is quite nice but is a different mix of green and grey altogether. Loden is more of a rich brownish green than a greyish green but are close enough to be similar at least.

Overall, I really enjoy the color and the ink. I am very happy I made the purchase.

This review is based off of my opinion and experience. I do not represent Noodler's Ink nor am I being compensated in any way.