Remember that post about my ink samples from Pear Tree Pens? Well, here are toothpick samples of many of them. In the aforementioned post, I mentioned my quest for the perfect burgundy. Let me tell you, none of the above samples are it! I will reiterate my distaste for pinkish burgundies, and most of these seem to be that. Diamine Claret? Come ON, people, that is just HOT PINK! The caveat is that these inks DO look different in pens, I have put some of them in pens and discovered that I still don't like them. The Mandalay Maroon and Diamine Maroon are both chalky, and just not the color I wanted. The Visconti Burgundy is quite nice, actually, but to me it is more of a red. Some of my own dark reds are closer to burgundy than the Visconti Burgundy. As for the Herbin samples, I've never met a Herbin red I liked. Those won't even see the inside of one of my pens. (Golly, maybe I should do a giveaway of all these wee ink samples I don't like!)
This photo, for comparison's sake, shows the dark red/burgundy inks I DO like. Many of these are in bottles, a few are samples. You have already seen examples on this blog of how different some of these inks look in a pen (see "a few red inks"). I don't really consider Monaco Red or Tiananmen to be burgundy or maroon, but they're great dark reds. PR Burgundy Mist is a GREAT color, but it dries really slowly (as nearly all the PR inks do), and that color is infamous for turning to brown after the bottle has been open for a while. R&K Alt Bordeaux is one of those purplish burgundy inks I actually DO like; can't really say why, it's just a color I really dig. I have that in one eyedropper pen that needs a refill right now, hmm.... Interestingly, Caran d'Ache Storm actually looks much darker in a pen - I don't care for this toothpick sample, but in a pen it's lovely. I only have a sample of that, but someday I may buy it in a bottle...
For search purposes, inks shown in this post are:
Diamine Amaranth
Diamine Maroon
Noodler's V-Mail Mandalay Maroon
Visconti Burgundy
J. Herbin Rouge Caroubier
J. Herbin Rouge Bourgogne
Diamine Claret
PR Black Cherry
PR Burgundy Mist
Caran d'Ache Storm
Noodler's Red-Black
Noodler's Swishmix Burgundy
Noodler's Tiananmen
Noodler's Widowmaker
Diamine Monaco Red
Rohrer & Klingner Alt Bordeaux
