Monteverde Mulberry Noir

Ink Reviews
Written By Julian

Ink Review #165

 

*Please note that the scan is the accurate representation of this color.

 

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The Color | Properties

Monteverde Mulberry Noir is a purple ink with heavy blue undertones. There’s not a lot of shading, but you may notice some light tonal variation with a soft gradient in cursive and a soft cut when writing in print. As I mentioned earlier, there’s quite a lot of blue in this ink, and while you may not necessarily notice it in writing, it’s easily visible in things like swatches and ink splats.

Ink droplets

Ink splat

 

Chromatography

 

Performance on Paper | Dry Times | Water Resistance

During my tests, I encountered light feathering on all of the test papers except for Midori. There was also minor bleeding on Rhodia, Leuchtturm, Maruman, and Kokuyo. This was mostly limited to the larger nib sizes, however, even finer nibs may have issues if the flow is wet enough. I highly suggest using this ink on a test page first.

Rhodia

Leuchtturm1917

The dry times are average, although surprisingly good on Rhodia, where it took no more than 10 seconds to dry across all the nib sizes. The other papers dried around 15-20 seconds with the large nibs, and 10-15 seconds with the finer nibs.

 
 

When exposed to water, the color quickly clouds over the writing. There are surprisingly dark and crisp pink shadows left over of the writing, but it’s messy and legibility may vary.

More Pages

Midori MD

Maruman

Tomoe River

Kokuyo

Performance in the Pen | Cleaning

Mulberry Noir has a medium-wet flow with excellent lubrication that makes for a pleasant writing experience. The ink performed well with most of the test nibs, but there were a few hard starts with the broad and 1.1mm stub nibs. On the other hand, the ink worked exceptionally well with the needlepoint nib. There weren’t any drops in flow during my extended writing tests, and overall, the ink performs well.

 
 

Unfortunately, the cleaning experience wasn’t so great. While the color seemed to wash quickly out of the nib units, the pen was left with a heavy ring or red residue along the inside of the barrel. There was also a red stain along the threads where the nib units screw in. I was able to remove both the residue and stains, however it required the dissasembly of the pen, as well as the use of a technical pen cleaner. I don’t reccomend using this ink with easily stainable pens or demonstrators.

 
 

Written on 52 gsm Tomoe River paper (white, 6mm ruling) with a medium nib.

Written on Midori MD paper (cream, 7mm ruling) with a medium nib.

Written on Midori MD paper (cream, 7mm ruling) with a needlepoint nib.

 
 

  • Performance in a pen: 9/10

  • Performance on paper: 7/10

  • Color saturation: 8/10

  • Sheening: 0/10

  • Shading: 3/10

  • Dry time: 7.5/10

  • Water resistance: 2/10

  • Ease of cleaning: 5/10

  • Shimmer: None

Award: Distinction in Inky Excellence

My Personal Thoughts…

Here I am, completely taken aback. When I began working on the Noir Collection reviews, I was completely convinced that Mulberry Noir would be my least favorite ink in the set. I wasn’t sure I liked how it looked when I swatched it, and it took me forever to find a pen to match it. I dove into the tests for this review under the mindset of simply getting it over with. And then, very quickly, I was proved wrong. As soon as I had it in a pen, I realized it was exactly what I was looking for in the Noir Collection inks: the color is dark, moody, and solid, with the same matte texture I fell in love with when I tried Mercury Noir years ago (it’s kind of Gengar colored…). I’m not sure if I love it quite as much as Mercury Noir, but it’s a very close second, and thinking more objectively, I think Mulberry Noir has the advantage. That’s not to say it’s perfect (it’s still a little feathery and bleedy on some papers, and the cleaning experience left a lot to be desired), however, if your paper can handle it, I think it’s a fantastic ink! I enjoyed this ink so much, in fact, that I need to create an award for it: I hereby present Mulberry Noir with the first-ever Distinction in Inky Excellence Award (trust me, it’s a big deal, probably).

 

Written on 52 gsm Tomoe River Paper with a Conklin Crescent Purple Fusion (medium nib).

 

More images/info:

 

Featured in the photography and writing samples:

Current text: The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett (Amazon)

 

Tools and materials used in the writing samples:

  • A TWSBI Diamond 580 AL with 7 nib units, including a Needlepoint grind, EF, F, M, B, 1.1mm stub, and an Architect grind. All nibs are tuned to perform at the same medium wetness.

  • A Rhodia No16 A5 DotPad

  • A Leuchtturm1917 A5 Notebook

  • A Midori MD A5 Notebook

  • A 52 gsm A5 Tomoe River Notebook

  • A Maruman Mnemosyne A5 Spiral Notebook

  • A Kokuyo Campus A5 Notebook

 
Julian
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Monteverde Mercury Noir