Lamy Crystal Inks First Look

[Says]

In case of you guys worry about the sheen ( like I did), Azurite is quite well behaved... took only 3 or 4 flushes to clean out my 149. Also, it is not very water resistant.

 

That said, I am sticking to pens that are easy to clean for this one. enjoy!

[penzel_washinkton]

I stopped at the Lamy San Francisco store yesterday. They still don't have the Crystal ink collection yet, they apologized for the delay and are saying the inks will be available by end of January.

 

They also said there's been a lot of people asking about the inks, and they (the SF store) plan on making a big promo push when the inks arrive.

 

You guys are luckier than I am. Here, they claimed that it will be ready in about 3 months (March/April)

[Says]

Its everywhere in Asia... i just saw it in departmental stores in taiwan and HK.

I Suspect Lamy has a very strong focus in Asia at the moment

[penzel_washinkton]

Its everywhere in Asia... i just saw it in departmental stores in taiwan and HK.

I Suspect Lamy has a very strong focus in Asia at the moment

 

Specific countries of Asia I believe, where fountain pens are highly anticipated such as China, HK, Japan or maybe even Malaysia.

Here, the enthusiasm towards fountain pen is not that high that made Lamy feel releasing it later on would be fine.

[tamiya]

Didn't see any sign of Crystal in Malaysia & Singapore last week

[Says]

really? I am surprised.... Singapore has a very strong culture for Pen collection too..

[alexander_k]

Quite by accident I saw the new Lamy inks in a local store. I'd made a mental note to try the Agate but the Benitoite also appealed to me, so I bought a bottle of each. Agate is a great grey, with lots of shading in a broad nib. Benitoite is a nice blue for a medium nib. It's early days yet but it won't surprise me if they end up among my favourites.

[Says]

Quite by accident I saw the new Lamy inks in a local store. I'd made a mental note to try the Agate but the Benitoite also appealed to me, so I bought a bottle of each. Agate is a great grey, with lots of shading in a broad nib. Benitoite is a nice blue for a medium nib. It's early days yet but it won't surprise me if they end up among my favourites.

I wanted to get the Agate too! but I just got myself a bottle of Iroshizuku fyu-syogun, and it is fabulous, and I honestly think having 2 shades of grey at the moment is too much... benitoite is definitely quite appealing! Great buys!

[alexander_k]

I wanted to get the Agate too! but I just got myself a bottle of Iroshizuku fyu-syogun, and it is fabulous, and I honestly think having 2 shades of grey at the moment is too much... benitoite is definitely quite appealing! Great buys!

 

I have to admit that I already have Diamine Silver Fox, Graphite and Earl Grey, as well as fyu-syogun in use (grey ink addiction in addition to blue ink addiction), and while I like them all, Agate and Silver Fox (the lightest) are my current favourites. fyu-syogun is a bit too bluish in comparison (but then again Agate is yellowish and Silver Fox a bit darker). It's great being able to play with so many good inks.

[Says]

In general, I have a tendency to Iroshizuku inks lately, and more and more to Lamy crystal.

 

I think they have great colours and are really well behaved! easy to Flush too! (Thats starting to become quite important when I keep changing inks!)

[ErrantSmudge]

I stopped into the Lamy San Francisco store yesterday. They finally have the Crystal inks in stock.

 

I spent some time at the counter with the salesperson, who let me sample all the inks (they had Vistas loaded with each color to use as testers). The salesperson was very knowledgable about inks in general and it was fun to geek out over inks with her.

 

I added a few inks from Lamy's standard line that I have lying around for reference. Everything was written with a Lamy medium nib, except for Lamy Turquoise which came from my Conklin Duragraph with a F nib, Petrol from a Safari with F nib, and Lamy Blue-Black which came from an Esterbrook with a B nib.

 

 

 

My favorites were the Peridot and Topaz, along with Benitoite and Beryl in that order. I'm not a fan of brown inks in general, but I really liked the auburn color of Topaz.

 

Amazonite is a really nice turquoise, but I was expecting it to be darker than Lamy Turquoise and for me it wasn't really. It is significantly greener than Lamy Turquoise, but I decided to pass. Likewise, I like Beryl but I wanted to see how close it was to Monteverde Garnet which I already have. I don't have need for that many purple-magentas in my ink stash.

 

Agate goes down very light, but darkens and shades as it dries. Benitoite and Ruby behave a little differently; they go down dark but lighten as they dry.

 

Benitoite is an interesting case. The salesperson says it is the one which has been selling the fastest, because it is such a unique shade and for its document qualities. I decided to pass on this one because it's very similar to Lamy Blue-Black. BB is a touch greener, Benitoite is a touch more purple with some gray undertones.

 

Topaz has also been a big seller for them. I asked about availability of these inks going forward and was told in practical terms I should treat these inks as if they were special edition, because Lamy provided very limited quantities of these inks to North America and they don't know when or if they will get restocked on them. They said they didn't get very many of each color in their shipment.

 

I walked out of the store with a bottle of Topaz along with Peridot. I didn't buy more partly due to budget, and partly due to having too many inks in my collection already.

Edited January 23, 2019 by ErrantSmudge

[penzel_washinkton]

Very nice, right now I will try to get the Benitoite and Azurite but after seeing the ink myself.

For browns I've got Diamine Ochre and Pelikan Edelstein Smoky Quartz covered. This is also the first time I find pinkish color, in this case Beryl, quite tempting to buy

[Uncial]

I picked up the Topaz yesterday. Some pictures made it look like it might be similar to Noodler's Whaleman's Sepia and others made it look like a reddish brown. Either would have suited me and to my eye it shares something more in common with Whaleman's Sepia with a certain purplish tone to it. It's a rich colour.......did you hear the massive 'but' coming?

 

This is by far the worst ink I own. It's as dry as the Sahara. I put it in a little cheapy pen and it stopped writing. I figured maybe I'd let some ink dry in it previously, so flushed that out and put it in a super wet Conklin Endura - possibly the wettest writing pen I own. It writes, but multiple hard starts and lots of skipping and I can feel every bit of the contact with the paper on this otherwise super-smooth nib. Stop writing for more than five seconds and it starts to dry out significantly in the nib. Not a pleasant experience at all. Pity, because otherwise the behaviour is good with no feathering, bleed or show through and a quick dry time.

 

Are all the other inks in the range as dry? I'm really tempted by the Amazonite, but if they are as dry as Topaz I won't be buying.

[ErrantSmudge]

Wow, I bought the Topaz as well but have not loaded a pen with it yet. I wonder how my experience will track with yours.

 

I bought Peridot as well, so it looks like I will ink up both soon to evaluate their properties.

[Says]

I think Obsidan is next on my list, but I need to clear some of my black inks first...

[Uncial]

Wow, I bought the Topaz as well but have not loaded a pen with it yet. I wonder how my experience will track with yours.

 

I bought Peridot as well, so it looks like I will ink up both soon to evaluate their properties.

 

Let me know what the results are for you. I suspect I may have a bad bottle. There is no SITBI or anything and it smells fine, but the few reviews of it out there don't mention the terrible dryness of the ink.

[ErrantSmudge]

 

Let me know what the results are for you. I suspect I may have a bad bottle. There is no SITBI or anything and it smells fine, but the few reviews of it out there don't mention the terrible dryness of the ink.

 

I just filled my Cross ATX M nib with Topaz. The ATX is one of, if not the, wettest pen in my collection and the feed can handle just about any ink thrown at it. I've only written a few lines in my journal with it so far, but I'm not seeing any issues. The ink is flowing about moderate, not too dry not too wet, which suggests the ink runs to the dry side but not terribly so. I will really need to write with this pen some more, give it a day or two to evaluate dryout, etc. in order to get a real opinion of the ink's behavior.

 

I also filled my TWSBI Eco M nib, another reliable performer, with Peridot. Peridot seems to be running slightly dry with this pen but not objectionably so. All that said, these are just first impressions and I need more time with both inks. I'm thinking of writing a full review of one or both for the Ink Reviews forum.

 

My bottle of Peridot opened fine. Topaz was difficult to open with a strange elastic resistance as I turned the cap. Once open, it was obvlous what happened: the cap liner is attached to the cap with a dollop of glue that simply gave way and left the liner stuck to the bottle. I was able to get the liner off, but not without splattering ink on my countertop and hands in the process. For a company that prides itself on its design prowess (the T52 ink bottle from their standard lineup being a perfect example), Lamy's packaging for their Crystal inks leaves a lot to be desired.

 

Edited January 29, 2019 by ErrantSmudge

[Enkida]

I'm in Germany, and we picked up a few bottle of these casually when we noticed them at our local stationary store before I realized they were actually hot topics! We have Beryl, Obsidian, and Topaz. I also wanted to get Azurite but let common sense rule the day. And I ran far away from Rhodonite when I turned the bottle over in the store and noticed all the big gold glitter particles sunk to the bottom (as I think someone posted a picture of in this thread).

 

I'm enjoying them all; I will say, I inked up a pen with Beryl and Yama-Budo side-by-side last week, and Beryl was a smidge darker than Yama-Budo on Leuchturm paper. I can try to scan in my quick test if anyone is interested in seeing that, actually.

(for my personal reference before my brain, filled with holes, forgets it: it's on page 66 of my Bujo)

 

I also did a quick comparison of Obsidian to Lamy Black and I was, personally, disappointed a little by it - it runs cool compared to Lamy Black, and I like my blacks warm. As a black ink goes, it was "nothing special" to me and I'd rather just pay less to get a warmer black, such as Lamy's own, or even just the bog-standard Pelikan 4001 brilliant black. (But it was husband's blind buy, so we have the bottle now anyway... sigh.)

 

Topaz is a nice warm brown which I really appreciate simply because Topaz is my birthstone ;-) However if you're drowning in browns, it's not really anything to write home about unless you have a soft spot for it for one reason or the other as I do.

 

I'm really interested in Azurite (and frustrated by the lack of in-depth reviews so far) because it has this delicious tendency to lean blue-violet in the offical printed sample literature that I saw in the store. They wouldn't let us test a writing sample there, it was buy or get outta town, unfortuantely, so I got outta town. The few snippets I see of it here and there in this thread make me suspect that I still want to have it, though!

 

 

Edit: also, just a personal note: the disappointment was great that there was no permanent version of "Dark Lilac" in the crystal ink releases. I hope they'll expand the line to include it one day, though, because Rhodonite looks suspiciously a lot like Vibrant Pink.

Edited January 29, 2019 by Enkida

[Uncial]

 

I just filled my Cross ATX M nib with Topaz. The ATX is one of, if not the, wettest pen in my collection and the feed can handle just about any ink thrown at it. I've only written a few lines in my journal with it so far, but I'm not seeing any issues. The ink is flowing about moderate, not too dry not too wet, which suggests the ink runs to the dry side but not terribly so. I will really need to write with this pen some more, give it a day or two to evaluate dryout, etc. in order to get a real opinion of the ink's behavior.

 

I also filled my TWSBI Eco M nib, another reliable performer, with Peridot. Peridot seems to be running slightly dry with this pen but not objectionably so. All that said, these are just first impressions and I need more time with both inks. I'm thinking of writing a full review of one or both for the Ink Reviews forum.

 

My bottle of Peridot opened fine. Topaz was difficult to open with a strange elastic resistance as I turned the cap. Once open, it was obvlous what happened: the cap liner is attached to the cap with a dollop of glue that simply gave way and left the liner stuck to the bottle. I was able to get the liner off, but not without splattering ink on my countertop and hands in the process. For a company that prides itself on its design prowess (the T52 ink bottle from their standard lineup being a perfect example), Lamy's packaging for their Crystal inks leaves a lot to be desired.

 

 

Meh.

I must have got a duff bottle. The seal on the bottle seems fine and was certainly screwed down tightly so I don't think any major evaporation has taken place.

[Uncial]

Went back, swapped the bottle and all is now fine. Still not sure what happened, but good to know it was a (hopefully) one-off bad bottle. Ink flow is now good and writes perfectly well in the pen.