Visconti Sapia (brown)

[npcole]

I thought I'd post a quick review of Visconti Brown since no one else seems to have done. I bought some on the recommendation of the nice people at http://pensplus.co.uk, who run a wonderful shop.

 

Visconti Blue is a lovely ink - a nice vibrant colour and a very good flow. It is maybe a little bright to use for letters or large pages, but I've taken to using it in notebooks, where it cheers up my notes considerably.

 

Visconti Brown is also a lovely colour, but does not have the good flow of Visconti Blue, and may make otherwise wet-writing pens feel like dry writers and sometimes even "hard starting".

 

It looks at its very best on cream (and quite yellowish) writing paper, where it has a wonderfully old-fashioned feel. It also works on white paper, though my eyes don't actually find the white/brown contrast makes for easy reading - and on white paper it seems to me to look out of place. Blue paper brings out the red in the ink, and it didn't look as bad as I expected it to.

 

Recommended, then, for those times when you'd like to give a letter a more gentle, historical feel, but probably not a good choice for an everyday ink.

 

The bottle, of course, is quite splendid!

[lefty928]

Thank you for your review! I love Visconti Blue, and it's helpful to know about the brown's flow characteristics.

[npcole]

My first review, no less.

[handlebar]

I have Visconti's brown and admit it is a delightful colour! Never had any viscosity issues fortunately. And the bottle design is worth buying a bottle for later use when the ink is gone!!

 

JD

Edited January 24, 2007 by handlebar

[PinarelloOnly]

The small bottle of Visconti Black that came with my Maxi was the worst flowing

ink I had yet and I actually threw the ink out. That ink also, did not flow well in

my wife's Midi and it was Visconti's own ink!

Edited January 25, 2007 by PinarelloOnly

[handlebar]

The small bottle of Visconti Black that came with my Maxi was the worst flowing

ink I had yet and I actually through the ink out. That ink also, did not flow well in

my wife's Midi and it was Visconti's own ink!

I received a small bottle of Visconti Black with my Van Gogh.It runs very smoothly through both my Visconti and Monteverde pens.

I have a feeling inks are like oils:there is always a difference between batches.The additives make the difference i suppose.Since i don't make my own ink i'm not sure.But it seems logical.

 

JD

[bob393]

Thanks for the rewiew.

I tend to be a Pelikan fan.

[Opus104]

Just tried Visconti Brown in my Sailor and I had the same experience. A lighter shade, but also a bit anemic. It reminds me a lot of MB Sepia. I'll stick with my Waterman Havana Brown.

[southpaw]

No problems at all here with my Visconti Brown - flows great, just like the blue.

[Ink Stained Wretch]

Oh, great! Now I don't know what to think. Is it a dry flowing ink or does it flow just fine? And here I am deciding on whether or not to buy some for a nice price :bonk: .

[BobR]

Oh, great! Now I don't know what to think. Is it a dry flowing ink or does it flow just fine? And here I am deciding on whether or not to buy some for a nice price :bonk: .

 

As always, the answer is "it depends". In a drier-writing pen, I had unsatisfying difficulties with this ink, but in my wet modern Aurora 88 cursive italic, it flows well and has tremendous shading. In any case, it's a beautiful color, so if you have the appropriate pen(s)--and you probably do--and are getting a good deal--go for it!

[offbase]

Mine flows fine in my .35-.4 stubbed Etruria. Not a gusher like Aurora black, but nice flow, and love the color. You looking at the $15, industrial-sized bottles at Swisher's? Grabbed me a bottle last week! Unless your pen is ink-stingy to begin with, I'd go for it.

[Ink Stained Wretch]

Oh, great! Now I don't know what to think. Is it a dry flowing ink or does it flow just fine? And here I am deciding on whether or not to buy some for a nice price :bonk: .

As always, the answer is "it depends". In a drier-writing pen, I had unsatisfying difficulties with this ink, but in my wet modern Aurora 88 cursive italic, it flows well and has tremendous shading. In any case, it's a beautiful color, so if you have the appropriate pen(s)--and you probably do--and are getting a good deal--go for it!

All right, thanks for the clarification.

 

Mine flows fine in my .35-.4 stubbed Etruria. Not a gusher like Aurora black, but nice flow, and love the color. You looking at the $15, industrial-sized bottles at Swisher's? Grabbed me a bottle last week! Unless your pen is ink-stingy to begin with, I'd go for it.

I went for it. The Visconti Brown is going for $8 a bottle as a clearance item. But in the "Attic" section when I clicked on it I was sent to PayPal directly, as opposed to the checkout area of the Swisher Pens site which I'm used to. And there they charged me $7 a bottle.

 

So I'll see how the stuff goes.

 

BTW, does anyone know just how much ink is in that Visconti bottle? On Swisher's Pens they say more than 3 ounces, closer to 4 ounces. I'm wondering if anyone knows a more precise figure on that? Ounces or mL is fine either way, I'm just curious about how much ink I'm getting.