Ink Review : Diamine Blue Velvet (150Th Anniversary Ink)

[namrehsnoom]

Ink Review : Diamine Blue Velvet (150th Anniversary Ink)

 

 

Pen: Lamy AL-star Ocean Blue, M-nib

Paper: Rhodia N° 16 notepad 80 gsm

 

 

Review

 

This ink is part of the 8-color set that Diamine released to celebrate their 150th anniversary (1864-2014). The set has quite a number of interesting colors. This pure blue ink is one of them.

 

Blue Velvet... the name evokes the image of a bright late-spring day with a deep blue sky. At the banks of the mighty river Anduin, Galadriel - the beautiful queen of Lothlórien - dominates the scene with her blue velvet reginal robe, waving her goodbyes to the Fellowship...

 

This ink captures the setting well. It is a deep pure-blue ink with no colored undertones, as shown in the chromatograpy. The ink flows well in my pens, and shows some nice - but not too much - shading. A simple but elegant blue for everyday writing, at home in your journal as well as in the workplace.

 

 

Fortunately for Galadriel, it is a bright sunny day without rain, because this Blue Velvet ink has no water resistance at all. Both the droplet and running water tests show without any doubt that water obliterates this ink. No legible traces remain. A shame, because this ink is otherwise very well-behaving.

 

Let's have a look at how it behaves on paper. For this, I did some tests:

• Rhodia N° 16 notepad 80 gsm - drying time 15-20 seconds, no feathering, no show-through nor bleed-through
• Paperblanks journal paper - drying time ~20 seconds, no feathering, no show-through and no bleed-through
• Generic notepad paper 70 gsm - drying time ~15 seconds, no feathering, no show-through nor bleed-through
• Moleskine journal - drying time ~5 seconds, no feathering (that's nice!), but significant show-through and very noticeable bleed-through (making the backside of the paper unusable)

Blue Velvet is a very well-behaving ink. Only with the awful Moleskine paper it leaves to be desired. On other paper, it behaves perfectly. You can't go wrong here.

 

Conclusion

 

Blue Velvet is an all-around true blue ink, that behaves well om a wide variety of paper. It's big downside is that it has zero water resistance. Myself, I don't care much about that.

But... for me the ink doesn't strike a chord. It's a decent ink for everyday use, but no queen material. This is one dress that will spent more time in the wardrobe than being worn.

 

my overall score: B+

 

 

 

 

 

[visvamitra]

Excellent review. I enjoy Blue Velvet. It's nice, well-behaved ink. I heard some people had some issues with it after some time but I have never experienced it myself.

[The Good Captain]

Thanks for a great review of a great ink.

[lapis]

Thanks for the good review. I use it a lot recently, dangling between it and the Regency.....

Ho hum, never can have enough blues...

 

 

Mike

[JulieParadise]

#50shadesofbluechallenge (link to the hashtag on Instagram) is the hashtag for the ongoing challenge over at the German PenExchange forum for July & August 2020. Since I inked up all my pens for this challenge with all the 50+ blue inks I have I also want to share my snapshots here.

 

 

Blue Velvet and a fat Pilot Parallel Pen were a nice match.

 

 

Diamine's inks may have become sort of "boring" for some considering all the new exciting exotic inks, but revisiting my stash every once in a while (even if prompted by a silly challenge like ours ) is always good to rediscover what I already have.

[ArchiMark]

Great review and samples, namrehsnoom !

 

 

Julie, nice ink / writing samples. Very helpful.

 

 

Thanks to you both for sharing.

 

 

Mark

[ParramattaPaul]

Thank you for a well thought out and presented review

[proton007]

Nice color, bad behavior in my experience. I think it's too saturated for modern pens - the only pens in which it did not dry up were those with ebonite feeds.

[A Smug Dill]

Nice color, bad behavior in my experience. I think it's too saturated for modern pens - the only pens in which it did not dry up were those with ebonite feeds.

 

 

Have you tried it in a modern Platinum #3776 Century pen (with a standard plastic feed)?

 

If I had a bottle (or sample) of it I'd be putting it in one of those (with a screw-cap), or even my trusty Pilot Elite 95S, Rotring 400 or Aurora Ipsilon (all with plastic feeds, and slip-/snap-caps instead of screw-caps), just to test your hypothesis; but alas, Blue Velvet is not one of the five Diamine 150th Anniversary ink colours I have.

[TSherbs]

Wow, Julie, great pics. And thanks to namerehsnoom for the review. This is an ink that I am considering. I'll likely sample first.

[sansenri]

nicely done review, I don't completely agree with the final findings, this is a really nice blue colour, exactly because it is a true blue and it is difficult to target this colour precisely without leaning on red or green. I agree with proton007 that it's slightly on the saturated side, but sometimes that is a nice characteristic (I just love how it pops out of the page in Julie's photos!). Likely, a very slight dilution (5-10% with distilled water) might improve that, but the final look on paper might also change...

[Detman101]

Thank you for the review and the info from others in this thread, placed a sample order for this one.
If it passes muster, will get a full bottle.

[senzen]

Here's how Blue velvet can come out in different pens:

 

 

On Rhodia pad paper.

[Detman101]

On 6/18/2024 at 2:39 PM, senzen said:

Here's how Blue velvet can come out in different pens:

 

 

On Rhodia pad paper.

Hmmm...well I run an oblique stub that is set to run fairly dry usually.
Hopefully I get a color like the "Waterman" for normal operation and the "Sailor" when I open up the aperture for more ink flow.

Thanks for the examples!!

[senzen]

4 hours ago, Detman101 said:

Hmmm...well I run an oblique stub that is set to run fairly dry usually.
Hopefully I get a color like the "Waterman" for normal operation and the "Sailor" when I open up the aperture for more ink flow.

Thanks for the examples!!

 

I tried it with several more pens, the usual hue is the one I get with my 21k Sailor Pro Gear.

[Detman101]

On 6/20/2024 at 10:41 AM, senzen said:

 

I tried it with several more pens, the usual hue is the one I get with my 21k Sailor Pro Gear.

Awesome. 
My sample is in-house, but I won't load it up until I finish the sample of "Caffe Crema" first... 😉