Diamine Inkvent 2025: Day 10 — Nostalgia
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. If you click and make a purchase, I may earn a small commission.
*Please note that the scan is the accurate representation of this color.
Day 10!
Welcome to day 10! Today, we’re looking at Nostalgia.
The Color and Properties
Diamine Nostalgia is a Chameleon ink. It has shimmering particulates in it that are supposed to change color depending on the lighting and angle at which the ink is viewed. The base color is a dusty burgundy that shades with a soft cut where the ink pools at the bottom of the letters when writing in both cursive and print. There’s not a lot of tonal variation in the shading, and the shaded areas are only slightly darker. The shading may also be difficult to see over the more prominent shimmer. As for the chameleon effect, I mostly noticed it taking on a similar burgundy to the base color and wasn’t able to see more colors in different lighting or angles.
Ink splat
Ink droplets
Performance | Cleaning
Rhodia
Leuchtturm
Nostalgia was well-behaved on all of the test pages I tried it with, and I didn’t notice any traces of bleeding or feathering. When inked, Nostalgia has a dry flow, and that unfortunately led to multiple clogs when writing with the fine nib. The other nibs didn’t have any issues with clogs, but about halfway through the page in my writing samples below, there was a notable drop-off in flow, and an eventual stop that required me to wait for the flow to catch up again. The ink also didn’t feel very well-lubricated, and the overall writing experience was poor.
Cleaning the base color out of the pen and nib units was as quick and easy as a soak and flush with a bulb syringe; however, there was the typical ring of shimmer along the barrel of the pen and piston crown that required me to disassemble to pen to remove.
Writing Samples
Written on 52 gsm Tomoe River paper (white, 7mm ruling) with a medium nib.
Written on Midori MD paper (cream, 7mm ruling), with a medium nib.
My personal thoughts…
For a while, I wondered what Nostalgia had to do with Inkvent’s theme, and I was well past testing it and finishing the review before it finally hit me: Nostalgia has everything to do with it. The holidays are an incredibly nostalgic thing. From the moment you take the first breath of wintry air, the nostalgic sensations it can carry are very powerful. For many of us, the Holidays can be the source of our best and warmest memories, and at the same time, the end of the year can serve as a time of reflection. So yes, Nostalgia fits right in. And although the color choice might seem arbitrary, that’s okay — it’s a subjective experience. But I think I think Diamine landed on an appropriate option here to reflect it, a color that conveys the depth of feeling nostalgia carries. It’s that much more unfortunate because the ink itself was incredibly unenjoyable to write with. Perhaps it would be better with a flow additive, but otherwise I can’t recommend this ink.
Written on 52 gsm Tomoe River paper with a medium nib.
More Images/Info:
Featured in the photography and writing samples:
Diamine Nostalgia
TWSBI Diamond 580, medium nib
Traveler’s Company “Have a Nice Trip” brass clip — Endless Pens | Amazon
Nanami Paper Tomoe River Cafe Note B6 Slim - Ruled
Midori MD A6 lined notebook — Amazon
Current text: A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens — Amazon
Enjoying this content? Consider donating or joining our Patreon! It goes a long way to allow me to put more content like this together (and hopefully, make it even better!), and every little bit is an immense help.
Tools and materials used in the writing samples:
A TWSBI Diamond 580 AL with 3 nib units including a Fine, Medium, and Broad. All nibs are tuned to perform at the same wetness.
A Rhodia No16 A5 DotPad
A Leuchtturm1917 A5 Notebook