Pilot Iroshizuku Tsuki-yo Ink Cartridge Review

Under no circumstances are fountain pen ink cartridges a good value. The cost per milliliter is higher than with bottled ink, and there is the added waste of a bunch of little plastic cartridges laying around.

Yet, I love them.

As with a lot of things ink life, moderation is key. My current ink bottle situation is an exercise in excess. Anarchy is a better term. Adding new ink cartridges to the situation doesn’t help, but I have some fixed ideas about pen and ink combinations, where the use of cartridges grants me the freedom to use certain pens more.

That sounds ridiculous, and it is. Then again, here you are reading a blog about stationery, so let’s at least be ridiculous together.

Would you be surprised if I told you that in three* of my priciest pens I regularly use ink cartridges? Why? Two reasons: 1. I want to use these pens, and this allows me to use them more, and 2. I found ink in cartridge form that I love.

Point one is laziness, let’s be honest. But if that is what gets me using a pen more frequently, then sign me up for a nap! In conjunction with point two, that ease of use combined with a heck of a good pen and ink combo, well, that is really what it is all about.

When I bought my Namiki Yukari Milky Way, I committed to using only one ink with it: Pilot Iroshizuku Tsuki-yo. It’s a great color, and a perfect match for the pen. I use it in bottle form, with the Pilot CON-70 converter, aka the best, worst converter in the world. The CON-70 is Pilot’s largest ink capacity converter, which is good, but I can only fill it and clean it well with a syringe, which is bad/annoying. Would I ever be able to get Tsuki-yo in cartridge form so I am less angsty about inking up what is quite possibly my favorite pen?

Pilot announced the launch of their Iroshizuku ink cartridge lineup in early 2022, and after a few delays in their worldwide release, they have arrived. 12 of the 26 stock colors are available in packs of 6 for a whopping $12.50 per pack. Each cartridge holds 0.8ml, putting the cost at two dollars and sixty cents per milliliter. Compare that to the 50 ml Iroshizuku ink bottles, which track at right around fifty cents per milliliter, and you realize how ridiculous they are.

But I love them. One six-pack at a time, because they make me want to use my pen more.

Like I said, there is no narrative that makes these a good value. Except one. How many milliliters of unused ink is sitting in a bottle on your shelf? Is it better to spend $25 and use 25% of it, or spend $12.50 and use 100% of it? There are a lot of ifs, ands, or buts in that statement, but we all want to use our stuff more. Smaller and less cost-effective may work in certain situations, as silly as that sounds.

Again, moderation is key here. I bought Tsuki-yo for a specific use case. I will not be adding another five boxes of Iroshizuku ink cartridges to the collection.

As poor as the price for these cartridges is, the ink itself is fantastic. I wouldn’t have sprung for them if it wasn’t. Tsuki-yo translates to “Moonlight Night” and is a beautiful dark blue with a hint of teal. On the right paper, there is a touch of red sheen to be found around the edges. It matches the Raden planets in the Milky Way wonderfully.

Fountain pen ink cartridges will always cost more than their bulk bottle brethren. They are great for travel, portability, and ease of use. The trade off is the price, and, on occasion, that’s a trade I’m willing to make.

(*The other two pen/cartridge combos I use are the Nakaya Portable Kuro-tamenuri with Platinum Mt. Fuji Blue Black, and the Nakaya Piccolo Negoro Orange with Platinum Carbon Black.)

(I purchased these cartridges from Yoseka Stationery for review purposes at full retail price.)

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Bungubox Original Ink Morning Glory Red Purple Ink Review

(Sarah Read is an author, editor, yarn artist, and pen/paper/ink addict. You can find more about her at her website and on Twitter. And check out her latest book, Out of Water, now available where books are sold!)

This bright pop of color is just what I needed on this cold, snowy week! Bungubox have released a pair of Morning Glory inks, in Red Purple and Blue Purple, to celebrate the vibrant colors of this fleeting flower. This bottle is the Red Purple colorway, and it's a stunner.

The bottle is a 22ml glass bottle with some lovely art on the label. The opening on these mini bottles is a bit small, so it may not fit larger pens. But despite the bottle's small size, the ink has a big impact.

It's a bright pink, almost neon, with high saturation that shows excellent shading. It can be a softer pink where the ink is finer, then pools to a lovely deep rose color. And it sheens! The sheen is a bright green-gold that really pops where the ink is heavier. Chromatography shows a bright magenta with a touch of emerald that combine to make a pink-purple tone.

It flows very well with no dry feeling at all, even in an EF nib, but it's also not too wet. The sheen doesn't show up much when writing with a fine nib, though. It needs a little more pooling for that to happen. It also needs a longer dry time, going past the 20-second mark.

Water drop tests show some water resistance. Where water was both dabbed and wiped away, there are some faint lines left behind, so a small spill may not erase all your work completely.

This color is unique in my collection. I'm sure there are near-duplicates out there, but this color is much brighter than the close matches I've tested before, and the sheen is sheenier.

Bungubox has these 20ml bottles for 1818 Yen, or between $13-$14, which is a pretty good price, as some of their other inks can exceed a dollar per ml. It's still on the expensive side compared to other brands, however, where you might get 40ml for that price. For a well-behaved ink in a great color with fantastic sheen, I think it's reasonable, and I'm excited to see how its partner color behaves for other reviewers. I may need to pick up a bottle, myself!

(This ink was purchased from Bungubox directly at the 2022 San Francisco Pen Show at normal retail price.)

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Membership starts at just $5/month, with a discounted annual option available. To find out more about membership click here and join us!

Anderillium Cephalopod Ink Review. Yes, All of Them.

(Kimberly (she/her) took the express train down the fountain pen/stationery rabbit hole and doesn't want to be rescued. She can be found on Instagram @allthehobbies because there really are many, many hobbies!.)

Brad handed me a set of Anderillium Cephalopod Inks at the Atlanta Pen Show earlier this year and I’m finally getting around to trying them out! Some of the inks from the Avian series have already been reviewed here including Shoebill Stork Grey and Purple Gallinule Purple. Rather than reviewing them one by one like a normal person, I thought I’d go crazy and do them all at once!!

The 8 inks in the Cephalopod series are as follows: Vampire Squid Red, Flapjack Octopus Orange, Bobtail Squid Green, Spirulina Green, Blue Ringed Octopus Blue, Flying Squid Blue, Cuttlefish Brown and Colossal Squid Dark. The inks come in 1.5 ounce (about 44ml) sealed glass jars that look like adorable little jam jars.

The plastic seals are perforated for easy removal. (Sometimes, it’s the little things that make me happy, ya know?)

I always add a label on top of bottles so I can easily find a particular bottle. Bonus that it looks neat too!

All swatches were done on Col-O-Ring cards using a Kakimori steel dip nib and writing samples were done with a TWSBI Go with a Medium nib. I decided to “use my shhhhhhiii…” as they say and busted out, not one, but TWO new notebooks for ink play/review - both of them are Endless Recorder notebooks with 68 gsm Tomoe River paper. Dry times may be a bit slower on 52gsm TR or faster on papers like Rhodia, copy paper, Cosmo Air Light or with drier or finer nibs.

Vampire Squid Red is a red that has a hint of pink and coral to it. It had average wetness and pretty fast dry times. There is minimal shading and no sheen.

Inks similar to Vampire Squid Red: KWZ Thief’s Red, TWSBI Crimson, ST Dupont Flamboyant Red, Robert Oster Santa’s Helper and Roher & Klingner Fernambuk.

Flapjack Octopus Orange is a nice bright orange with a slightly wet flow, which was surprising since it felt a touch drier during writing. There is minimal shading and no sheen.

Inks similar to Flapjack Octopus Orange are Akkerman 16 Oranje Boven, Kobe 25 Tarumi Apricot, Leonardo Arancio Tarocco, Diamine Orange and Sailor 50 States Florida.

Bobtail Squid Green is a lovely, bright spring green with average flow and slightly longer than average dry times. I kept thinking of Iroshizuku Chiku-rin while I was writing but it’s definitely not that similar. Usually this type of green can feel dry but this one was not. It has nice shading as well.

Inks similar to Bobtail Squid Green include Diamine Meadow, Akkerman 28 Hofkwartier Groen and Robert Oster Citrus. Iroshizuku Chiku-rin is lighter and more yellow.

Spirulina Green is a straight up green ink that I was surprised I didn’t have more matches for. The flow is average and had dry times all over the place. I would have to rate it as medium to slightly longer dry time since I was still able to smear it at the 60 second mark. There is minimal shading and no sheen..

Inks similar to Spirula Green include Montblanc Irish Green, Pelikan Edelstein Aventurine and KWZ Green #2. Other “regular greens” either had more yellow, more blue or were lighter or darker.

Blue Ringed Octopus Blue is a nice bright turquoise blue, not quite green enough to be cerulean, that has an average flow. There isn’t really any shading or sheen. Dry time is average to slightly long. There are quite a few “common turquoise” inks that are similar in color.

Inks similar to Blue Ringed Octopus Blue include Caran d’Ache Hypnotic Turquoise, Kaweco Turquoise, Lamy Turquoise, Pelikan 4001 Turquoise, Pelikan Edelstein Topaz, Waterman Inspired Blue.

Flying Squid Blue is an interesting color that sometimes looks like a blue black and other times a dark blue-leaning teal. It is a fairly wet ink that has no shading but can have a hint of pink sheen on the wettest edges. The sheen is more prevalent in bigger swatches. Dry time is pretty long (anything over a minute is plenty long).

Inks similar to Flying Squid Blue include Pure pens Westgate Hotel, Fanyantan #24-8 The Sea, KWZ Walks Over Vistula and Colorverse Cape May (though there isn’t much sheen in the latter two.)

At first glance, Cuttlefish Brown looks like a regular dark brown but after watching the swatch dry as well as doing the dry time tests, it is definitely a little more interesting. It is a dark brown that has hints of green/olive. It is not warm a yellow-toned brown, but the green adds some complexity. It has average flow and average to slightly long dry times. There is no shading or sheen. I was surprised that I don’t really have a lot of inks that were very similar to this one.

Inks similar to Cuttlefish Brown include KWZ Dark Brown (which has more red), Robert Oster Motor Oil (which has a touch more green) and Bungubox Espresso (which is a bit too warm.)

Colossal Squid Dark is a color that goes down dark and shows its true color when dry. When I first swatched it, I thought it was black but once it dried, I could see that it was a very dark green-leaning teal. It had average flow and average dry time (some of the other inks had average flow but longer dry times). There is some shading but no sheen. Again, I was surprised that I didn’t have many inks similar to this.

Inks similar to Colossal Squid Dark include Lamy Petrol (which is a touch greener) and Diplomat Black (which has similar undertones but is more, uh, black lol.)

All in all, the inks behaved well, some were a little wetter than others and had slightly longer dry times. If I had to pick favorites in the bunch, they would be Vampire Squid (which surprised me since I’m not a big red ink fan) and Bobtail Squid. I would have liked to have seen a purple ink in this set as it would have made a nice balance since the last two inks felt so dark..

Anderillium inks sell for $14.50 per bottle, $45 for 4 bottles or $85 for the 8 bottle set. I think the colors are nice and they are worth the purchase if you don’t already have similarly colored inks.

(Brad purchased this ink at regular price from Anderillium Ink at the 2022 Atlanta Pen Show.)