It would not surprise me if you’ve never heard of Rohrer & Klingner before. I only first found out about them when I received the samples. Rohrer & Klingner Leipzig-Co. is a German company founded in Leipzig in 1907 by Johann Adolf Rohrer and Felix Arthur Klingner. They have a long and well established history for creating inks and other products related to lithography. You can find out more about their history at their website: http://www.rohrer-klingner.de/en/sites/0.htm They currently produce 18 different colors available in 50ml glass bottles.

I just got back from the Pear Tree Co.’s midwest office with a bottle of Solferino [sol-fuh-ree-noh] and a sample of Helianthus [hee-lee-an-thuhs]. I should note that R&K have redesigned the cap to the bottles and I like it much more than the older plastic cap. You can see to the left that they switched to an aluminum style cap, which to me is more visually appealing. Hopefully, this new cap will prevent a common problem associated with the older style cap where ink would find its way on the threads, dry out, and become crusty. This problem really bothers some people and it’s nice to see that R&K is paying attention to these little details. The only downside to this new cap design is some might think it will be harder to get the cap off because there’s not much to grip on to compared to the older plastic cap. But, I can assure that I haven’t had any problems getting a good grip on this cap.

Now, on to the review of the Helianthus ink. A good friend of mine likes to describe this ink as follows: “It’s like wringing out a school bus onto a piece of paper!” and I agree 100%. It’s a fantastic yellow ink that actually shows up well enough to be readable. If you’re using this in anything other than the driest of nibs you’ll get a saturated yellow with a slight hint of burnt orange, which contributes a lot to making the ink easy to read.  The performance of this ink is on par with the other R&K inks I’ve reviewed so if you’ve read those then you know what I’m talking about. If not, I’ll give a brief synopsis. All the R&K inks I’ve sampled so far have performed great. Very little to no bleeding on regular printer paper and only a tiny bit of feathering. On Rhodia comparable quality papers there’s absolutely no feathering or bleed-through. This ink, like the others, does take a while to dry but certainly not longer than anything else I’ve used.  Check the writing sample below:

I’m not sure if I’ll be buying a bottle or not, but that’s only because I don’t know how often I’ll use yellow ink. I can tell you that my Pelikan M200 will stay filled with it until I’ve emptied the sample. If you’re looking for a yellow ink or just a good ink in general be sure to check out Pear Tree’s supply. They have every color of R&K available so get ‘em while you can.

It would not surprise me if you’ve never heard of Rohrer & Klingner before. I only first found out about them when I received the samples. Rohrer & Klingner Leipzig-Co. is a German company founded in Leipzig in 1907 by Johann Adolf Rohrer and Felix Arthur Klingner. They have a long and well established history for creating inks and other products related to lithography. You can find out more about their history at their website: http://www.rohrer-klingner.de/en/sites/0.htm They currently produce 18 different colors available in 50ml glass bottles.

Fernambuk was the last of the Rohrer & Klingner samples I tried. It is a nice, bright red color that really pulls your eye towards it. It has a hint of orange in it on my monitor that shouldn’t be there and I hope it appears closer to its actual color for your sake. This is probably one of those inks where you just need to get a sample of it for yourself so you can experience its true color.

As with all the other Rohrer & Klingner inks Fernambuk flows well, lubricates the nib nicely, and resist shading on printer paper very well. The Pelikan M200 is what I reach for if I want to see how much shading an ink has. Fernambuk has very little if any. So, if you’re looking for an ink that dries quickly with lots of shading then you’ll want to look for something else. But, if you want to try some new colors and need a high quality, dependable ink, then this ink is well worth your money.

It would not surprise me if you’ve never heard of Rohrer & Klingner before. I only first found out about them when I received the samples. Rohrer & Klingner Leipzig-Co. is a German company founded in Leipzig in 1907 by Johann Adolf Rohrer and Felix Arthur Klingner. They have a long and well established history for creating inks and other products related to lithography. You can find out more about their history at their website: http://www.rohrer-klingner.de/en/sites/0.htm They currently produce 18 different colors available in 50ml glass bottles.

The ink I’m reviewing here is called Morinda and it is a color I’m having difficulty accurately representing. It is definitely a red with slight rust colored under-tones. It’s not a bright color but it is still saturated and very appealing. The sample written on the Rhodia paper is much closer to the actual color than the sample on the printer paper. This ink retains the qualities of the other R&K ink I’ve tried, even the slightly extended drying times when written with a wet nib.

Please forgive my mistake of calling the pen I used the “Lamy M200″ in the sample. It should be the Pelikan M200. I chose to do the writing sample with this particular pen because if an ink has any shading to it at all this pen will bring it out. It is somewhat of a wet writer so that will contribute to the longer drying times. You can see below that this ink resist feathering on printer paper, even when with the heavy flow of the M200.

This particular color of ink doesn’t appeal to me as much as the Solferino, but it’s still a good ink in and of itself. Like I said in the Solferino review, if you’re looking for new colors then you must give this ink a try.

It would not surprise me if you’ve never heard of Rohrer & Klingner before. I only first found out about them when I received the samples. Rohrer & Klingner Leipzig-Co. is a German company founded in Leipzig in 1907 by Johann Adolf Rohrer and Felix Arthur Klingner. They have a long and well established history for creating inks and other products related to lithography. You can find out more about their history at their website: http://www.rohrer-klingner.de/en/sites/0.htm They currently produce 18 different colors available in 50ml glass bottles.

If you’re looking for a black ink that doesn’t have to be the blackest of all blacks then you should give R&K Leipziger Shwarz a try. In addition to being a high quality ink it also has a slight bit of shading to make it more interesting. If used in a drier writing pen it would give a nice dark gray/charcoal color. Because of the quality of this ink and its’ shading I think it has the potential to stand with the best of the black inks available today, including Aurora Black.  The only thing holding it back is its delayed drying times when used in a wet writer.

Just like the other R&K inks this one does very well to resis feathering on printer paper. Where some inks are almost unusable because of how much they feather you will be able to rely on this ink to control itself.

It would not surprise me if you’ve never heard of Rohrer & Klingner before. I only first found out about them when I received the samples. Rohrer & Klingner Leipzig-Co. is a German company founded in Leipzig in 1907 by Johann Adolf Rohrer and Felix Arthur Klingner. They have a long and well established history for creating inks and other products related to lithography. You can find out more about their history at their website: http://www.rohrer-klingner.de/en/sites/0.htm They currently produce 18 different colors available in 50ml glass bottles.

The ink I’m reviewing here is called Solferino, a beautiful purple that has found its way to the top of my lists for purples. The ink itself has great qualities, which is consistent among the 4 colors I’ve used. The ink has good saturation which contributes to a drying time on par with Noodlers or Private Reserve. If you’re looking for a quick drying ink this probably isn’t going to suffice. I’ve provided a writing sample below with drying times marked in seconds:

Please forgive my mistake of calling the pen I used the “Lamy M200″ in the sample. It should be the Pelikan M200. I chose to do the writing sample with this particular pen because if an ink has any shading to it at all this pen will bring it out. It is somewhat of a wet writer so that will contribute to the longer drying times. You can see that in the first half of the stroke it is dry with no smearing. Only in the second, much wetter half of the stroke was smearing an issue.

I also did a sample on printer paper to see how much it would feather. Due to the wetness of the nib I would say it did pretty good.

If you’re looking for a great ink and some new colors then don’t hesitate to get a hold of some R&K samplers. I can’t wait to get a bottle of Solferino for myself.

I used the ink on three different papers: Clairefontain, Rhodia, and Piccadilly.  I used the same pens as I did with the Orange Indien review except for the Parker 51.

Click the images for a supersized scan. Warning, they’re large (~6MB).

As with every ink I’ve used on my Clairefontaine paper, this ink performed exceptionally well.  I noticed it doesn’t feel watered down and provides a very smooth writing experience, even with the italic nib in my Faber Castell Ambition.  The only thing to watch out for if using this ink on this paper is the drying time.  If you’re a lefty it’ll be problematic and you should try it on Rhodia paper.  If you’re a righty I don’t think you’ll have to worry about it.

The differences in the writing experiences between Rhodia and Clairefontaine are barely noticeable.  They’re both incredibly smooth, hold ink very well, and don’t feather or allow bleed through.  I think the drying time for the Rhodia paper is slightly quicker, I’m talking like a second or two.  But as I mentioned above, that may be a very important factor for the left handed writer.  Other than that they’re so similar I usually don’t have a preference unless I’m using an italic or cursive italic nib, but those details should be saved for a paper review.

My final test was on my Piccadilly pad.

As to be expected the ink feathered and bled through the page, just like nearly every other ink I’ve used in the Piccadilly.  Go here to see my review of the Piccadilly pad and what inks I recommend for it.  In the written portion on the Piccadilly pad I did comment on the color depth of the ink when used in pens that flow more or less than “standard” (if there is a standard flow).  After writing several sentences the color difference between the pens become harder to notice.  It’s more pronounced when you start writing after a slight pause.  I don’t consider this feature positive or negative, just that it should be noted.

The more I use J. Herbin inks the more I like them.  I really like the colors and the way the ink performs.  The Vert Empire, along with all other J. Herbin inks I’ve used, flows well in all my pens and exhibit little to no nib creep.  If you have a chance to try a sample I highly suggest you do.

I’ve only used one other J. Herbin ink before, Lierre Sauvage.  It is a beautiful green, one which I’m quite fond of and is of high quality.  I was not sure what to expect from the Orange Indien but after using for a few days in several pens I can say I’m very pleased with its performance and especially its color. The only thing I’m not happy about with this ink is that unless you clean the pen out VERY well it will take on the tint of the previous ink in your pen. I flush my pens several times, until the water comes out clear, before I put in a new ink and Orange Indien still changed colors on me. If this happens to you I would suggest only using this ink in a brand new pen and reserving that pen just for orange and yellow inks.

One thing I need to make a comment on is the bottle.  Not that it has any influence on the review of the ink itself, but it’s just such a nifty design.  I really like the integrated pen holder but I think the execution is poor. The seem in the middle doesn’t provide a stable rest and is barely large enough to suit a Parker “51″.  The other downside is that the bottle is a little shallow.  Trying to fill my Vanishing Point nibs will start to become a problem once the ink level has dropped just from 2-3 fills.  There are ways around this problem, but none of them are very convenient.

The first writing sample I conducted was on Clairefontaine paper.

Next is a writing sample on Rhoida.

As was expected, the ink performed about the same on both papers, which is to say very well. And just for fun I decided to see how the ink performed on a Piccadilly pad, which can have a problem with feathering. Unfortunately, Orange Indien feathered too, which isn’t all that surprising as I’ve only been able to find one ink that didn’t feather on Piccadilly and I can’t remember what it was.

Click on any of the pics for very large resolution scans.