Ink Review: J. Herbin Lierre Sauvage

It rained for four years,

eleven months,

and two days.

The sky crumbled into storms and hurricanes

that scattered roofs 

and knocked down walls

and uprooted every last plant of the banana groves.

- Gabriel García Márquez, 'One Hundred Years of Solitude'

In this part of the world where I live, the dry spell is over, having been banished by the typhoons of the now-officially declared wet season. I like this season of the year - not for the rain and wetness - but because I see green everywhere! What used to be dry, brown spots are now thriving with growth and greens. Now I can walk and run again! Isn't it refreshing to brisk walk after a heavy downpour? It feels so refreshing to be outside when everything has just been washed by the rain.

This may be a surprise because I am known to hate the rain. Well, I do. So I will stop rattling about it and just write about this wonderful J. Herbin green ink from Karen Doherty though Quo Vadis Blog's St. Patrick Day giveaway. And let's hope it doesn't rain for four days, eleven months and two days on this part of the planet. :)  

I received this bottle of J. Herbin Lierre Sauvage in early April, and that gave me enough time to use it before writing this review. I was reluctant to use it at first because green is not an ink color I am usually fond of, but I was so attracted to Lierre Sauvage's hue that I filled my (green) Chelpark Moti pen with it, pronto. And LS did not disappoint. I wrote an entry in my diary with it and I'm happy that it is indeed, a readable green.

I know much has been written about the J. Herbin ink box. I have written as much (read here, here, and here) so I will not do a repeat. But the Herbin bottle, though, is a beauty. Each Herbin bottle has an elegantly designed label and an integrated pen rest as shown in the photo below. I've always complained that the pen rest is too shallow/narrow to fit any regular-sized pen, although my white Unic fits in the groove perfectly, and this slim 1957 Sheaffer cartridge pen fits comfortably; I learned through Brian Goulet (of Goulet Pens Company and Ink Nouveau) that the pen rest is really meant for the Herbin glass dip pens. Now that makes sense. :)

I love playing around with the bottle, so here is another photo with the bottle turned upside down. Doing that shows the embossed print that says "J HERBIN PARIS".

Here's how the ink looks inside the bottle, which is very dark and almost black. But note that the ink on the bottle's neck (below) and walls (see photo above) somehow show the true green color of Lierre Sauvage.

And now the written review. Lierre Sauvage is a moderately saturated ink, that has excellent, consistent, wet flow. Writing is smooth for both round and italic nibs, and shading is seen in both. I enjoyed writing with this ink on my Sheaffer CP and 1.5mm cursive italic Rotring ArtPen. I had no feathering or bleed problems with the Rhodia Reverse notebook paper.

Below are macro shots of several portions of the page above, to further show how Lierre Sauvage behaved on Rhodia paper from two different nibs.

This doodle is written using the Sheaffer CP, which has a medium nib.

Text below was written using the same Sheaffer CP. Notice the evident shading.

Now SKY, taken from the quote was written using the 1.5mm Rotring ArtPen.

I love the clear shading seen here... 

...here...

...and here. In the slanted line of the letter N (and on the lower line of K from the SKY photo), look closely to see that it is subtly divided, made by the separation of the nib tines.

Lierre Sauvage is a green ink with traces of yellow, or orange, which contributes to its brightness. In the photo below, it is clear that this bright (but not neon-bright) readable green ink shows more yellow than blue (like Diamine Woodland Green - that's for the next ink review), black (like Private Reserve Avacado, my first green ink which I use sparingly due to its saturation), or gray (like the vintage, made in the Philippines Parker Super Quink Permanent Green).

Lierre Sauvage dries fast enough. After the 15th second, it has completely dried on paper, including the dots and end points of strokes. I did not do a comparison with the other green inks, though. 

Lierre Sauvage borrows its green hue and icon from the wild ivy, which is its direct translation. I am loving it, and currently has three pens on my pen wrap inked with it.

J. Herbin inks are available in 30 beautiful colors. These water-based inks are non-toxic, have neutral pH and manufactured using natural dyes. Dowload a printable PDF of the J. Herbin fountain pen ink swatches here.

A 30ml bottle of J. Herbin ink sells for P475 at Scribe Writing Essentials, and US$9.50 at The Goulet Pen Company. (I have no affiliation with either companies, though.)

J. Herbin Lierre Sauvage ink used in this review courtesy of Exaclair, Inc. through Karen Doherty and Rhodia Reverse Notebook from fellow fountain pen collector and budding business entrpreneur John Raymond Lim. The two pens used, the Rotring ArtPen and Sheaffer CP both belong to my collection.

Read More

If You Forget Me by Pablo Neruda

I love poetry. I've always have. In high school, I liked Christina Georgina Rosetti, and later in college, I devoured Sylvia Plath. A few years back, I read about the Italian film 'Il Postino', a fictional story about real-life poet Pablo Neruda. I was unlucky in my search for a copy to watch, so I consoled myself with the incomplete sountrack I received from a friend. Aside from the film's score, the soundtrack also includes Pablo Neruda's poems being recited by various artists including Madonna, who recited this lovely poem.

I've said that I'm new into calligraphy, and Chancery is the only form I could do now. I rendered the poem using four cursive italic calligraphy pens, inked with four different inks on a Rhodia Metallic Reverse notebook. I did this at 2 in the morning last Saturday, to loosen up after reviewing for my exam later that morning on Cross-Cultural Communication.

First page, photo above. For the title and second paragraph, I used my Sheaffer NoNonsense pen with a fine italic nib filled with Diamine Burnt Sienna. The first paragraph was written using a Lamy Vista with a 1.5mm italic nib, inked with J. Herbin Rouille d'Ancre.

Second, page, photo above. I used a Lamy Joy with a 1.9mm italic nib inked with Diamine Chocolate for the first paragraph, and a Rotring Art Pen with a 1.5mm italic nib inked with J. Herbin Lierre Sauvage. Love these colors!

Below are photos of the last paragraphs of both pages. These are very poignant words. And though they may come across as words directed towards someone's lover, they are actually Neruda's expression of love for his country, Chile.

Inks behave differently in different pens on different paper stocks. If Diamine Burnt Sienna is on any of my Parkers, it writes very pale brown strokes. On the Sheaffer NN, it's marvelous! The classy, lovely rust-brown color is amazing! It has excellent shading, too. This paragraph reminds me a lot of Alanis Morissette's You Oughta Know.

This green is J. Herbin Lierre Sauvage, the ink I got from Exaclair's/Quo Vadis' Saint Patrick's Giveaway. I am not a fan of green inks, but I love this one! Excellent shading, excellent flow, great color!

The J. Herbin inks used in this review are courtesy of Karen Doherty, Marketing VP of Exaclair; while the Rhodia Metallic Reverse notebook is from the FPN-P May pen meet raffle. The Diamine Burnt Sienna and all the pens used belong to The Archer.

Read More

Notebook Review: Monologue Platinum Notebook

With this post, I am officially back to blogging.

I received a small box of notebooks from Grandluxe early this year. From the four notebooks I received, this silver notebook caught my fancy. Among the leather- and damask-covered notebooks, I liked this one more than the others because of the metallic look and feel of its polyurethane (PU) cover.

The Monologue Platinum A6 notebook I received from Grandluxe of Singapore measures 5 7/8 × 4 1/8 inches, almost the same size as a large Moleskine notebook. A smooth, wide groove on the rightmost part of the cover bears the notebook's matching elastic band.

The Platinum notebook allows for its owner's personalization/customization because immediately after the notebook's inside flyleaf are the following pages:

Personal Notes

Address

Website and Blog

The white, 80gsm, acid-free paper used for this notebook is ruled with clear, gray lines, with different margin settings on all four sides. The top margin is more than an inch wide, the left and bottom margins almost half an inch, and the right margin has a quarter of an inch. The paper is smooth, and has a lovely 'new paper' scent to it. The only thing I do not like about the notebook's pages is the page corners - they're not rounded.

But I forgot the page corners when I saw the notebook's edge: the pages are silver gilted! Cool!

I did this cover's torture test once to my Quo Vadis Habana notebook, and though I cringe at the thought and sight of it, this test is actually very helpful. It lets me know how a notebook's leather will wear off through time. This is important to me because the spine of my first Moleskine was already falling off and I was not even half into using it. I hope that the Platinum's thicker PU cover will last longer.

The Platinum notebook has a back pocket, too, like most of my notebooks. Though it's a functional feature to some, I do not use the back pockets of my notebooks to store anything at all. For the simple reason that whatever is inside the pocket creates a bulge that gets in the way of my writing on the paper on top of it. 

The Monologue and Platinum icons are etched in the lower portion of the notebook's back cover. Charming.

And now for the ink tests on the Monologue Platinum notebook.

I wrote on the Monologue Platinum notebook using different nib and ink combinations. On this page, feathering is seen on the first line where I used a Lamy Joy 1.5 italic inked with Camel Scarlet Red. Most of the inks tested showed medium to excessive feathering. And this broke my heart for I really wanted to use this notebook for journalling. As it is, the paper could not hold ink even from the finest in this lot, my Platinum Preppy.

This is the back side of the ink test page. Grandluxe paper is clearly not meant for fountain pen writing.

Lastly, this is the page after the ink test page. The inks just bled too much on this paper.

Finally, would I keep this notebook? Yes. But I will have to think of a better use for it. I love to write on my journal/diary using my fountain pens and that will be a problem because the Monologue Platinum paper cannot hold the inks. I can use this elegant looking notebook for note-taking, but then again, I'd have to find a pen with an extra fine nib and fill it with a very dry ink. And so the search starts now. :)

Grandluxe is a Singapore-owned company founded in 1945, offering high quality and trendy diary/planners, organisers, calendars, journals, leather accessories and stationery products. The company supplies to major bookstores and retailers in more than 30 countries in five continents. Here in Manila, I've seen Grandluxe notebooks in Glorietta 3's Bibliarch, in Makati.

The Monologue Platinum notebook used in this review is courtesy of Grandluxe of Singapore.

Read More

Rhodia and Thein the Frankenpen Go to Puerto Galera

My Rhodia pad and Frankenthein in Puerto Galera Beach, May 2010.

With summer nearing its end, the organization I work for kindly sponsored an all-expense paid two-day trip for all of us to visit Puerto Galera. On the first day, we had lunch by Tamaraw Falls and hiked to Ponderosa Golf and Country Club. In the afternoon, I had a massage on the beach, and played Maria Goes to Galera and lost. LOL! Later in the night, I had a taste of the famous 'Mindoro Sling' while waiting for my henna tattoo to dry. :)

My hennaed hand. Photo taken by award-winning photographer EJ Azucena.

It was snorkelling and diving the second day, and while it was scorchingly hot in the beach, and most of my companions enjoyed the waters, I stayed behind sheltered in the cool and comfortable room provided by Marco Vincent Dive Resort. :)

When I went out the afternoon we were to go back, I brought along my gear: Thein the Frankenpen and my Rhodia notepad which proved to be useful later as we played 'FLAMES' while stuck in heavy Calamba traffic the night we went home.

Read More

Ink Review: J. Herbin Poussière de Lune

The moon shines down on a sleeping lizard

Little fish rain down from the sky.

Outside the window there are soldiers

Steeling themselves to die.

- Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore

I'm back to blogging, reviewing, and writing after a long absence. And to celebrate the turn of recent events, here is Poussière de Lune, an amazing, amazing ink from J. Herbin. I am reviewing this ink for two important persons in my life: for him, who will be the only man there is for me, and for her, from whom I gather inspiration and strength - this is to celebrate your new endeavor.

There are no dead soldiers here, though. Nobody died.

I got this J. Herbin ink from Exaclair early this year, and as with all the inks I received from the generous Karen Doherty, I used Poussière de Lune before writing the review to have full observation of how the ink will behave on different pen and paper combinations.

Poussière de Lune is a lovely dark purple ink with strong hints of gray. Unlike my other purple J. Herbin ink Larmes de Cassis, which has a brighter hue, Poussière de Lune has a subdued hue brought by the gray undertones. It looks darker while wet, but dries a charming purple-gray.

Poussière de Lune brought back memories of long gone time at my parents' house, when on balmy summer nights, I would leave the big windows in my bedroom wide open to let the moonlight in. There's a different but poignant feeling brought by the sight of the silvery moonlight bathing almost everything inside my bedroom. Back then, on full moon nights, I'd stay awake late into midnight, just lying in bed, listening to the stillness and enjoying the exquisite serenity of the moment. Sometimes I would listen to jazz on late night radio, or read a book, but mostly, I'm content with just moon watching.

The other thing I love about J. Herbin inks is their boxes. They are durable and compact - very easy to store, but their tasteful design makes the Herbin inks inside them more unique and special. I think the small icons are cute and charming, and they break the uniformity of the black laminated boxes.

All J. Herbin boxes has an ink list on the back side. Cool. I crossed out all the inks I got now on the box of my first Herbin ink, Rouge Opera.

The color guide on the box's top cover is excellent! In my box of inks, I sometimes find it hard to see the one I'm looking for, so these color guides are very helpful.

Poussière de Lune is a saturated ink with consistent and excellent flow; and writing is smooth for either nibs I used for this review: a round medium in an Inoxcrom P200, and a 1.5mm cursive italic in a Schneider Creativ calligraphy pen. I have no feathering and bleed problems with Poussière de Lune either on the Rhodia pad (left) or the Scribe notebook (right).

I love the shading of Poussière de Lune, better seen in the text written with Schneider calligraphy pen on Rhodia pad. The Scribe notebook's paper shows very minor shading as it is highly absorbent. When used on round nibs, the ink appears to be dark and concentrated, but a closer look reveals that the beginning of a stroke is thinner and paler than the end stroke.

Poussière de Lune on Scribe notebook.

And on Rhodia pad.

Here is another pen and paper combination, initially what I wanted to use for this ink review. I've had a Brause calligraphy set (also from Karen) for some time now, and I thought the review is a great chance to start using them. However, the 1mm Bandzug nib seemed to scratch both the Rhodia and Scribe paper. I tried other notebooks, but the Merit Coilless notebook surprised me when it stood up to the sharp Bandzug nib. I went back to my usual ink review gear after my patience wore off with continuously dipping the Bandzug nib on the bottle after only a couple of letter strokes.

Poussière de Lune takes a longer time to dry, almost the same as Orange Indien. Perhaps its saturation prevents it from drying faster, or it's the nib I used that prolonged the drying time, or the paper (this is a different Rhodia pad from the one above), but it doesn't bother me at all. 

Poussière de Lune and Inoxcrom P200 on the purple notebook specially handbound by my great friend and fellow fountain pen collector Mona Caccam for me.

Poussière de Lune, translates into 'moon dust', and so far, is the only ink that has prompted me to read a lot in order to understand the ink name and color combination. I enjoyed reading about lunar dust: its corrosive properties, that it smells differently here on earth (odorless) and on the moon (like gunpowder) and that it can cause 'extraterrestrial hay fever.' Interesting reads and I got so much information that I did not even learn in Earth Science way back in college. LOL!

It also got me thinking for days about the song which has the words 'moondust in your hair'. I scrounged every nook and cranny of my brain to recall that song until I realized I could just Google it, anyway. And it's Close to You, by the great Karen Carpenter. :) Used that part for my three quotations in this review, all special to me.

J. Herbin inks are available in 30 beautiful colors (see the list on the box above). These water-based inks are non-toxic, have neutral pH and manufactured using natural dyes. Dowload a printable PDF of the J. Herbin fountain pen ink swatches here. Similarly, the J. Herbin 340th anniversary ink Rouge Hematite is now available at selected retailers and a sample review has been posted by Stephanie at Rhodia Drive.

A 30ml bottle of J. Herbin ink retails for P475 at Scribe Writing Essentials in Manila, and for US$10 at The Goulet Pen Company.

Brause pen, Bandzug nib and ink reviewed here, all courtesy of Exaclair, Inc. through Karen Doherty, while the Scribe notebook from Scribe Writing Essentials through Marian Ong.

Read More

Notebook Review: Clairefontaine Basics Clothbound Notebook

When I received the package that Karen Doherty of Exaclair sent me in September, I liked everything in it except a black, plain notebook. :) It's a medium Clairefontaine Basics Clothbound notebook with black cloth binding and black cover, but had the purest whitest paper I've ever seen. Back then, I was craving orange Rhodia pads, orange Webbies and other colorful notebooks, so I kept the Clairefontaine Basics notebook for future use. While looking for a notebook from my stash sometime last week, I saw the Clairefontaine Basics once again, and though it may not have been love at first sight for me, the notebook held my attention the next time we met. 

First of all, I searched for the notebook's name, and I'm happy to learn that it is called the Clairefontaine Basics Clothbound Notebook. I didn't know it then. Hm. Aptly named, huh? It measures 5.75 x 8 inches, is made in France, and the solid cardboard cover has texture like grainy leather. The purest whitest paper in the Basics notebook is pH-neutral and acid-free 90g Clairefontaine paper. Whoa.

This time around, I fell in love with the simplicity of this French-made notebook. There is nothing fancy, or elaborate on its cover except for the modestly placed Clairefontaine logo embossed on the lower right corner of the front cover.

The cloth binding in this black Basics notebook blends well with the color of the cardboard cover. Simple, neat, modest.

The Clairefontaine Basics notebook is clothbound and sewn using linen thread. Its pages open flat and that makes the Basics notebook easy to write on. There are just so many features to make one fall in love with this notebook: rounded corners, ruled, unmargined pages, and it doesn't have a dangling ribbon pagemarker. (I don't have anything against pagemarkers, they are just annoying at times.) The Clairefontaine paper used is chlorine-free and made only with pulp from trees harvested from certified sustainable forests. (Clairefontaine is the only European manufacturer that makes its own paper for its own products.)

The purest, whitest paper of this notebook is touted to be the best paper for fountain pen use. I know this is true, but I want to do a more demanding test on this notebook, so I used most of my wide nibbed pens. First, my calligraphy pens: Manuscript, Lamy, Osmiroid. The mediums followed: Haoililai, Wality, Lamy, Schneider. Then, I used most of my wet inks: J. Herbin, Camel, Waterman, De Atramentis. The results? See the photos below. :)

I did not see any feathering on the Clairefontaine paper...

... nor any bleed at all. What is seen here is the ink showing through the other side of the page.

Clairefontaine Basics Notebook is a neat notebook. Simple and elegant, yet, sturdy and durable. I like its simplicity, but mostly, I love it because it makes fountain pen writing possible, and a wonderful experience, too.

The Clairefontaine Basics Clothbound Notebooks are available in a variety of sizes and covers. See the selection at Exaclair's website, the 2010 catalog is presented as an interactive online publication, very much like browsing a printed catalog, which is another cool thing from Exaclair.

The Clairefontaine Basics Clothbound Notebook and other Clairefontaine notebooks are available online at the Goulet Pen Company, and from other stationery stores.

Read More

I Love Notebooks, Part 2

I just love notebooks. Remember this post about my 55 notebooks? All of them 55 are still with me at home, but now they got 57 more companions! Oh, there are worse addictions, as the Pen Addict loves to say. It's hard to believe I got 57 more new notebooks after the 55 I've counted last July. The funny thing is, I did not know about this until two nights ago when I was tidying up the large plastic boxes where I keep my notebooks. I took most of them out the boxes, and the tall stacks suprised me. Counting them was a bigger surprise for I surpassed the previous record by a hairline number: 2 notebooks!

First stack on the left, 18 notebooks. Middle stack, 22; and the third and last stack has 17 notebooks.

First stack. From the bottom: 5 Mead, large Golden Gate, Eagle Index, orange Clairefontaine, purple Clairefontaine, medium Golden Gate, orange Geman notebook from George, 4 Memo Notebooks from our Recto trip last year, black Clairefontaine, small Blue Feather, and small Golden Gate.

Middle stack. From the bottom: QV Habana, black large Scribe, 2 red large Scribe, Grandluxe Damask-covered large notebook, large silver Grandluxe Monologue Journal, Exacompta skethcbook with red leather cover, black large Clairefontaine Basics, Graf It 909 sketch pad, 2 Korean nobtebooks I got from National Bookstore, G. Lalo pad, Rhodia Bloc No. 16, a leather-covered notebook I won from a pen meet raffle, large orange Rhodia Webbie, purple notebook from Mona, small white Grandluxe Dialogue notebook, Green Apple faux-leather covered journal, and 4 Rhodia Bloc No. 10s.

Last stack. A colorful (but very FP-friendly) notebook from Korea, 2 Rhodia Bloc No. 14s, 2 Clairefontaine hard-covered notebooks, pink Daycraft Signature, blue Grandluxe Mosaic, 2 small red Scribe, small black Rhodia Webbie, small Clairefontaine notebooks, Paul Smith Rhodia pad, and small purple Granluxe Elastiq journal.

So what do you think, Nifty? Would 57 more notebooks give me a place in your Notebook Addict of the Week list?

Read More