The darker side of purple
My journey towards an enjoyable and functional combination of daily drivers continues. The goal is a grey and a black ink. Grey ink for repeated tasks and the structure of my weekly. Black ink for important tasks and marking my progress on each task. The black should stand out from the grey.
I took a new angle on the project this week. Instead of a black and a grey, I chose a very dark grey ink and a lighter grey. The combination still offers “black” as a subtle accent color.
Black ink adjacent?
Chushu dries far more quickly than the black inks I’ve tried so far. I feel Chushu will get be both sides of what I’ve been experimenting for: a near-black accent to my grey daily driver that dries quickly enough that it works well for managing weekly tasks.
The result is two dusky purple-pink inks and two grey inks with purple undertones. As a whole, this week’s palette finds me on the dark side of purple. What does my attachment to murky purples say about my feelings this week?
Anyway: I split each color family between one broad nib and one narrow nib. Narrow F and EF suit my typical small handwriting well.
Broad nibs give me writing options for headings, marking, and journaling. Writing with a round broad nib is also comfortable during fast-moving meetings where I know I’ll have to jot notes quickly. There will be a lot of those meetings this week.
Hooray meetings
I went with eight pens total, two in each color family. Only one combination, the Orange Indien in a SF nib, is a bright color. It’s my marking pen for the week.
Grey/Black
Montblanc 146 Le Petit Prince and Fox (EF). Sailor Shikiori Chushu. Chushu is a quick-drying dark grey ink with strong purple undertones. The shorter dry time should make this combo well-suited for managing tasks: no more smearing. The line is a true EF, which is excellent for use on weeklies. Daily driver, task management.
TWSBI 580-AL Turquoise (EF/M Predator Hybrid, by Nibgrinder). Diamine Earl Grey. This combination is just wet enough to remain enjoyable to write with. Earl Grey succeeds as a quick-drying light grey in this narrow EF. It also succeeds as a mid-toned M when reverse writing. This is one of my two meeting pens for the week as it can handle both headings (M) and detailed notes (EF). Meeting notes, task management, scratch notes.
Blue/Teal
Sailor Pro Gear Graphite Lighthouse (Z). Jacques Herbin Kyanite du Népal. This combination remains wet enough to resign it to excellent coated paper. The line is broad enough to work well for faster writing tasks like drafting and meeting notes. Journaling, lesson plans, meeting notes and essay drafting.
Franklin-Christoph 03 Ghost (EF-SIG, by Franklin-Christoph). Colorverse Warped Passages. The sharp EF SIG is best for slow writing tasks like outlining lesson plans, journaling, and letter writing. Warped Passages is wet enough to smooth the edged out a bit. That opens other tasks like reading notes to this combo, too.
Earth Tones
Lamy Safari Terra Red (B). Sailor Shikiori Rikyu-Cha. A surprisingly wet combination. Intended for journaling and meeting notes. A broad round nib suits fast writing. I form larger letters when I write quickly – we’re talking three or four 3.7 mm lines. Meeting notes, journaling, and lesson plans.
Pilot Custom Heritage 912 (SF). J. Herbin Orange Indien. My favorite marking orange. Bright and easily viewable. Not red – and so anxiety resistant for my students. Shades a lovely dark orange on coated paper. This is my marking combination. And just in time for the next round of student papers. Marking, meeting accent notes, lesson plans.
Wild Cards
TWSBI 580-ALR Prussian Blue (B). Sailor Shikiori Yozakura. Excellent combination. The B nib is just wet enough to bring out Yozakura’s dark shading. Well behaved lines mean ink dries quickly enough to be useful as an accenting and annotating pen. Reading notes, meeting accent notes, lesson plans, journaling.
Delike New Moon 2 Green (EF). Monteverde Rose Noir. The EF on this pen is fantastic. It offers a smooth and well-behaved true EF line. The feed is wet enough to bring out the darker elements of Rose Noir. The Delike takes three turns to uncap. That makes it a secure – if marginally inconvenient – pocket carry. Lesson plans, accent notes, journaling, pocket notes.
