Krishna Mumbai : A Reddish Ink with Green Sheen

[Matthew TWP]

This is part of the Krishna "India" series of inks, which also includes "Dilli" (aka Delhi). Like most of the Krishna colors, it is sold in a smallish 20ml bottle that reminds me more of a medicine bottle than anything, and the label on the bottle can be described as "functional", with the outer ring of color indicating the base color of the ink, and the text color indicating the color of the sheen. The bottles cost about $9 each. I bought mine at PenChalet, but several places seem to stock them. I've included some images to show the bottle and box details and some other elements for scale. The LIFE notebook is an A5 size.

 

 

 

"Mumbai" is a hard color for me to describe. When it's wet, it's a vibrant vermillion, but as it dries it fades to a darker brownish red. What makes the color hard to describe is the fact that it sheens bright green in almost any circumstances, and the interaction of the two colors is a little confusing to my eye. 

 

 

 

Because of the green sheen, this is an ink that I actually prefer to use on cheaper papers. When I write on printer paper (HP Premium32), the sheen is better controlled and the base color is more consistent. Luckily, this ink is remarkably well behaved on cheap paper. I have a Cognitive Surplus notebook that's filled with some sort of grey recycled paper that is not at all fountain pen friendly, but this ink does reasonably well.

 

In these two photos, I photographed the same set of swatches from opposite directions, one to catch the sheen and one to try to avoid the sheen.

 

 

This is simply a swatch of the ink on HP Premium32 printer paper to show the degree of sheen that appears.

 

And finally, a few writing samples.

 

First, this image shows the shading that you can get with the ink (Tomoe River 68gsm) when you don't see the sheen.

 

Here are samples with B, M, and F nibs on ruled Rhodia paper:

 

And on un-ruled Tomoe River. Note that this paper has a warmer tone than the Rhodia.

 

So, the ink tends to look more brown than anything else in normal use, though in some light it appears to be a mahogany or rusty red. For me, that makes it a much more useful ink than a more standard red would be. Even when writing on cheap paper, I get virtually no feathering or bleed through. The ink dries a little more slowly than a typical ink, but it's not a slow drying ink in the way that something like Apache Sunset is.

 

Here are a few shots that hopefully will allow you to see some of the sheen that appears in normal writing on Rhodia and TR papers.

 

 

 

Oh, and I forgot to add this close up of the box, earlier.  Hope that some of you find this review useful!

 

[LizEF]

Great review!  Thank you.   It's an interesting color.  I especially like the shading.  Thanks for the excellent photos showing off this ink.

[yazeh]

Thank you for such an in-depth review

 It looks  like the darker version of Jungle volcano...

 I actually like the bottle. There's something artisans about it is endearing.....but I am not a fan of sheening inks. I find them distracting. 

[chromantic]

Normally I'm a sucker for green sheen but I'm also very particular about reds and, finally having found one I really like (Diamine Monaco), I'll stick with it.

Especially where you say "it looks more brown in normal use", the effect of green overlaying the red. KWZ Maroon suffers from this as well, according to someone I sent a sample to, though I didn't notice that much myself and I only use it in a roller now.

[Matthew TWP]

Yes, the combination of red and green is a visually confusing effect for me. Sometimes I think that it's an interesting and dynamic effect and I like it, at other times I just think it's a little unsettling. I do like the base color, though. 

[RJS]

A very nice looking ink. Thanks for the review!

[mizgeorge]

This reminds me of Diamine Manggis, which is a slightly darker, pinker red, but has the same very heavy green sheen. It's one of those inks that I wouldn't ever use as an everyday thing, but is fun for a bit of playing around with from time to time. 

[Bo Bo Olson]

Krishna inks done on 90g Oxford Optic and 90g Clairefontaine Triomphe

Mumbai, with a Geha 725 F nib that is on the dry side of semi-flex so I'd rate the wetness of the nib more like regular flex. I bought the wet Waterman Blue for this pen, it wrote so dry.

 

Mumbai is brown/maroon ink, no shading, no sheen....and was supposed to be brown and green sheen....and I was ever so hoping.....

The OP has what I thought I was going to get.

 

An OK color.......I'm glad it was bought in India and flown in for free. I'd not recommend that ink version that I got, in I'm sure there are other inks that have bigger bottles and a better mailing price when out of India.

There is bound to be a Diamine ink that matches it's hue. I will use the ink and glad it's only 20ml, in as a hue its ok, but has no shading nor sheen, which would have made the small bottle ok.

 

Chennai was just if not more disappointing. Supposedly according to the ad swath a light brown and dark blue. It looks like a dark greyed green...perhaps tealish.

 

Whit these two inks, promises were not kept with shading nor sheen.

 

Shook the bottles, just in case, re-loaded....no improvement.

 

I did those two inks in F&M...and don't think I'm going to waste time inking a B that has to be cleaned for either.

With Moonview and Night at Sea, there was sheen. I thought B was too wet in the shading was drowned.

They will be tested someday with a F nib, in B was too wet.