Platinum Lavender Black

 

Platinum brought out a range of inks a few years back and they were all iron-gall based, black toned inks. The range consisted of 6 inks and includes Sepia, Lavender, Cassis, Black, Khaki Citrus and Forest Green. I only picked up one of these colours, Lavender, as the others were very green/brown/yellow based and they aren’t really colours I use.

(Apologies about the colour of this photo - not sure what happened with this one)

Iron gall inks (in my experience) typically fade to a dusty colour after it dries and has a muted appearance and based on my experience with the Lavender, it seems to behave in the same way. When wet, the ink looks quite red, like a dusty brick red colour, but when it dries, it becomes a purple toned burgundy type colour. Its quite interesting and very unique in my ink collection. There’s a fair bit of shading but no sheen or shimmer in the ink.

On the downside, the ink is very very dry. Even in my TWSBI medium nib, which is typically really wet, its horribly dry and it took a long time to prime it so that the nib would write. I cannot imagine using this ink with a fine or a dry nib when its so dry with a wet nib. I’ve tried this before with my Pilot 74 which is a springy wet nib and had the same problems.

Sadly, with this level of dryness, its too unusable for the pens in my collection and I just don’t love the colour enough to try and make it work for me. Plus with the extra maintenance that iron gall inks required (whether perceived or actual) this ink is just that bit more work for me that doesn’t have the pay off.