Diamine (Les Couleurs du Comte) Bleu Cuivré review

[A Smug Dill]

 

La Couronne du Comte (LCdC), a writing instruments retailer based in the Netherlands, has a series of currently four shop-exclusive (Les Couleurs du Comte) inks which, judging from the bottles, are manufactured by Diamine and priced in kind, notwithstanding LCdC listing itself as their manufacturer in its web shop catalogue. Unlike other Diamine country- and shop-exclusive inks such as November Rain, Bloody Brexit and Cult Pens's Iridescink series, these are not available in the typical Diamine 80ml glass bottles, but only the 30ml plastic bottles. On top (literally) of that, the labels look dark and dull, and I must say all the more unattractive for that.

Source: La Couronne du Comte

 

So, in spite of my being quite wanton in procuring Diamine (and other) inks by the dozens from Cult Pens, I've never really had all that much interest in these products. While PenGallery Malaysia managed to get quite a bit of positive reception for its Diamine shop-exclusive Jalur Gemilang and Manggis inks (available only in 80ml bottles), and consequently increased exposure for its online retail presence to hobbyists outside of the Far East, the Les Couleurs du Comte inks have received little attention in the community and I don't recall seeing a single review or active user comment for any of them.

 

For the everyday asking price, I suppose they'd do as well as items such as spare converters, if I needed to pad an order to qualify for free international shipping. Recently, such an occasion arose, so I ordered whichever one was showing as in stock at the time. That happened to be the blue sheeny one: Bleu Cuivré. Its name means absolutely nothing to me, and so uninteresting that it didn't even occur to me to learn to spell it correctly, unlike with Sailor Shikiori, Pilot Iroshizuku and (at least some of the) Rohrer & Klingner and Pennonia inks. It's only just now, when I went to get the link to the product page, that I realise I misread the writing (several times!) on the gloomy bottle label, and incorrectly wrote Bleu Cuioré on all the artefacts for the ink review shown here. Yes, the actual label looks as dull and is as difficult to read as advertised.

 

 

 

Anyway…

 

 

Colour: Blue with reddish brown (‘bronze’?) sheen. Not a bad colour, although I'm sure there must be already at least one, two or a dozen other Diamine sheening blue inks that look somewhat like that.

 

Flow, saturation and lubrication: Quite a bit of dye seems to get deposited just by touching the tip of my Pilot Plumix M nib (on a converter-filled pen with this ink) to a strip of filter paper. Shading is very subtle and difficult to spot on the page, even though the ink itself should be capable of a fair range in shades of blue. So I'd say the ink is ‘wet’ and ‘saturated’, even though the use of the terms to describe ink is contentious and questionable. No hard-starts and no ink starvation observed with either pen used, and the writing experience tended more towards smooth than ‘feedback-y’.

 

Feathering: Not observed on Rhodia Dotpad 80g/m² paper.

Show-through: Not observed on Rhodia Dotpad 80g/m² paper.

Bleed-through: Not observed on Rhodia Dotpad 80g/m² paper, not even where I wetted the paper with droplets for the water resistance testing.

 

 

Drying time: Around 25 seconds on Rhodia Dotpad 80g/m² paper, maybe a bit less; but I reckon some part of the sheen will easily get smudged on subsequent contact, even when the ink has dried on the page.

 

Water resistance: Low. The ink doesn't get washed off the page completely, but reading the information content off the residue grey marks would be hard, and not made any easier by the run-off dye.

 

Shading: Very subtle, and because there is so much sheen, your eyes will struggle to discern any shades of blue when the reddish sheening component provides such strong contrast.

Sheen: Heaps.

 

 

My verdict: The ink probably deserves the same standing as Diamine Sargasso Sea, (Germany-exclusive) Skull & Roses, Cult Pens Iridescink Maureen, etc., and isn't priced so differently from those to put it at a disadvantage, if this product — with a single retail source, thus making it one of those things you seek out and buy only if it's worth the ‘hassle’ — wasn't packaged so unattractively and marketing effort for it nigh nil.

[lapis]

Nice review and thanks for your input. Sargasso Sea also came to mind, as well as WES Imperial Blue although LCdC is likely somewhere in between. I think I see here and there a "touch" of Mr Pen's Radiant Blue. Still, it's the bottle itself -- as you said -- which distracts me. Never did like those 30-ml thingies. Always worried that my M1000 won't even fit in and/or that it'd knock the whole bottle over.

[mizgeorge]

Great review! I like the 'new' format very much. 

 

I'm not a huge fan of inks that sheen so much that you're still picking up colour long after they're dry, and haven't particularly enjoyed the sibling inks you've referenced.

 

Funnily enough, I think I prefer the colour of this one when you've added water - I wonder if it would take some dilution?

 

I'm also not a huge fan of the Diamine 30ml bottles - I tend to end up decanting them into something more practical as I'm never confident they'll stay upright, and whilst I can understand the thinking behind it, I dislike the dark plastic (which I believe is also amongst the worst offenders from an environmental pov?)

 

On the whole, I think I'd just get a converter.

[TSherbs]

Awesome review, Dill. Full of useful information.

 

Personally, I like the underlying blue tone, but the resulting purply look (to me) from the excessive sheen is unappealing. IMO.

 

I like these little bottles (except that they are plastic): it's usually all the ink I need of a specialty color. I've only emptied two 50+ml bottles in the last 9 years (Noodler's Black and Pelikan 4001 Konigsblau).

[A Smug Dill]

27 minutes ago, Dione said:

I think that if you search you might find that several reviewers including Nikki Stewart reviewed both of these inks.

 

Are you talking about the PenGallery exclusives, or the LCdC exclusives? I know Nick Stewart reviewed the former, as did @Chrissy “inkyfountainpens” who was formerly a very active ink reviewer on FPN. Kelli “Mountain of Ink” McCown reviewed Jalur Gemilang. I read them before deciding it was worth the ‘trouble’ for me to get a bottle of JG from its single exclusive retail source, and it is now one of my favourites — if not the outright favourite — among Diamine inks.

 

I'm assuming LCdC didn't reach out to some of the more prominent and well-regarded ink reviewers known to the hobbyist community, and invite them to review the shop's new own-brand inks. At one point it sent me a complimentary bottle of Comte d'Or with an order; at the time it was summer holidays in Europe, and LCdC had advertised on its web shop that being cognisant there may be delays in fulfilling orders due the stoppage in the supply chain, any customer who placed orders that August would get a free gift, so I took it that the bottle of ink was said gift (not that I cared). I also recall it offering the Les Couleurs du Comte for €0.99 or some such for a period of time last year, if the items were added to orders with other items.

 

I imagine spending some money to make the retail packaging more attractive, and getting the word out via ink reviewers with an established audience, would have been more fruitful as far as marketing efforts for the LCdC inks go.

[yazeh]

Nice review Dill. 

I can understand how cuivré (coppery) might turn into cuioré as for me I mix up often Sailor and Pilot ink names. 

I find the label design quite elegant on the other hand.

The ink itself, well... after a while one become blasé. 

 

 

 

[LizEF]

Thanks for the review, Dill - very thorough and a good read!  The color is far too ordinary a blue for me, but I love the cameo appearance of Mr. Crab!

[Peter1977]

Thank you for the review. I agree completely on the packaging. I have three of the four inks they released and when I swatched them I had to look on the website what the correct spelling was of the name since the labels are so difficult to read. I do love the inks though, especially the Vert Sapin-ink, which is a green with a red sheen.

 

I do remember some of these inks of LCdC being reviewed bu a few YouTubers, maybe Pens and Tea? Not sure.

[inkstainedruth]

The color is interesting, but the dry time?  Not so much.

Thanks for the review, though.  You've saved me money so my wallet also thanks you....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth