Most people know Vanness Pens in Little Rock, Arkansas as the go-to resource for rare and unusual inks. They have one of the largest selections of fountain pen inks in the world, and are always the first to import new lines of ink from Japan, Korea, the Netherlands, the Philippines - you name it. As experts in the subject, I guess it was only a matter of time before they started mixing their own inks! Today I’m reviewing two inks developed in collaboration with artist Joey Feldman: a black ink called Inktober 2019, as well as a red/burgundy called “Good Evening,” which you might find reminiscent of a certain highly coveted limited edition ink from around 2013. (It’s intentional.)
Let’s start with Inktober. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, #inktober is an online challenge in which participants post one drawing per day for the month of October. As someone with zero artistic ability who assumes that people will be easily bored by an endless array of stick-figure cartoons, I’ve not participated, but I always enjoy seeing the amazing work that everyone else can do.
As the name implies, the Inktober ink was formulated as a black ink for sketching during the month of, well, Inktober. It’s impermanent by design - many of the #inktober entries have featured brush and ink-wash techniques that take advantage of this ink’s ability to shade when diluted. That said, I absolutely LOVE this ink as a black ink for writing. I’d compare it to Lamy Black or Rohrer & Klingner Leipziger Schwarz, which are both interesting black inks with different tones to them. I do think that the Inktober dries quicker and feathers less on inexpensive paper, and of course, with these two inks you don’t get a bottle featuring Joey Feldman artwork.
I think I like Joey’s caricature better.
“Good Evening” is easily my favorite of these two releases, which should come as a surprise to no one. It’s a rich red ink that I could alternately describe as “burgundy red” or “blood red,” depending on the light. Both the name and the design on the bottle should give you a good idea of the inspiration for this particular ink, and it’s absolutely amazing to see someone come EXTREMELY CLOSE to duplicating what I consider one of the best red inks ever made. Good Evening also makes for an excellent writing ink, and given that it writes relatively wet and flows well, the lack of feathering and bleedthrough surprises me. (The writing sample featured here was done with a firehose broad nib on a Lamy 2000.)
Some of the difference here is the lighting, and the fact that the Montblanc Hitchcock is still wet, but the ink on the left has a bit more red in it than the “Good Evening.” Once the inks are thoroughly dry, the match is closer, but not exact.
Another picture taken after the ink swatches are dry. You’ll notice that the Good Evening still has slightly more purple/blue, while the Hitchcock has more red. Hitchcock can also have a slight gold/brown sheen to it (the “dried blood” effect).
Takeaways and Where to Buy
Inktober and Good Evening both have the potential to become favorites, and I’m looking forward to more special edition runs and, hopefully, a standard lineup from Vanness in the future. Right now, you can purchase the Inktober 2019 Limited Edition Ink and “Good Evening” for $15 per bottle on the Vanness website. If I didn’t already have a gazillion bottles of ink sitting in a cabinet in my home office, I’d be buying multiples. These inks are that good.
Also, don’t miss the Vanness Fountain Pen Day Orange Ink, made to match the Limited Edition FPD Franklin-Christoph 31 pen released yesterday! Vanness still has both pens and ink in stock, though the pens are a limited run of 88 so I’m not sure how long they will last. Also, be sure and check out yesterday’s Deals & Drops post, which highlighted this and several other Fountain Pen Day promotions. At least one sale (Pen Chalet) has been extended through Sunday.
Disclaimer: I received the two bottles of ink featured in this review, free of charge, from Vanness Pens for review purposes. This post contains links to paid sponsors and affiliates.