Ink Review: Diamine Imperial Purple

[Chrissy]

Today I'm reviewing Diamine Imperial Purple
Imperial Purple is a true purple that leans more towards the blue side of the colour spectrum. It’s an ink from the standard Diamine ink range.
It’s a saturated ink that can show a little shading with finer nibs. I found it flowed well with all of the pens I tried it in, felt neither wet nor dry, and it’s lubrication was nice and smooth across the page.
My review was written on cheap printer paper, that is quite absorbent, and I saw no spread or show-through. The lines were crisp and it dried quickly.
On Field Notes paper it didn’t spread or feather, and only showed through a little. Writing on the reverse side of all of the papers I used would be acceptable as show-through doesn't look as bad on paper than when it is scanned and shown on screen.
It's not sold as a waterproof ink but showed good water resistance. I used running water on the right half of the water test square.

• Flow Rate: Good - neither particularly wet nor dry
• Lubrication: Good - felt smooth across the page
• Nib Dry-out: Not noticed.
• Start-up: Immediate.
• Saturation: Saturated
• Shading Potential: A little shading seen with F nib.
• Sheen: None noticed.
• Show-Through:
  
  • Oxford paper
  • Silvine Notebook
  • Rhodia Graph
  • CiaK by InTempo
  • Field Notes
  • Hobonichi Techo paper.
  • Tomoe River 52gsm paper (not very much)
  
  
• Spread / Feathering / Woolly Line: Not seen on any paper I used, even Field Notes
• Nib Creep / “Crud”: Not seen, even after several days in the pen
• Staining (pen): Not seen after several days - easy clean-up
• Staining (hands): Easy clean-up off of skin with bar soap.
• Clogging: Not seen.[/*]
• Water resistance: Not sold as waterproof, but shows good water resistance.
• Availability: Available in 80ml and 30ml bottles plus cartridges from Diamine Inks web-site and many other outlets.

Diamine Imperial Purple 1.jpg

[Lady Onogaro]

This is one of my favorite purples.

[Chrissy]

This is one of my favorite purples.

It is a rather nice ink. I thought there would be several purple inks like this, but not so many were a similar colour.

[Spideysgirl]

Long story short, I didn't care for the color purple much. But after getting into fountain pens the color began to grow on my and I'm sampling purples now. This is one I have in my sample caddy. After reading this review I'm going to put it in a pen to use this week at work. Thank you for the review.

Sent from my PH-1 using Tapatalk

[Chrissy]

Long story short, I didn't care for the color purple much. But after getting into fountain pens the color began to grow on my and I'm sampling purples now. This is one I have in my sample caddy. After reading this review I'm going to put it in a pen to use this week at work. Thank you for the review.

Sent from my PH-1 using Tapatalk

You're welcome. I hope you enjoy it.

[titrisol]

Chrissy, are you comparing that to Waterman Tender Purple? In your sample it looks incredible blue!

[Chrissy]

Chrissy, are you comparing that to Waterman Tender Purple? In your sample it looks incredible blue!

Yes, that's my old original bottle of Waterman Purple. However, with purple shades, it's much more difficult to get the main colour as well as all of the comparisons correct. I'll get the sheet out and have a look before it goes dark.

OK, I've tried to tweak it slightly. Better?

[titrisol]

No big deal!
Just asking since I like tender purple but love Pelikan purple and this diamine maybe in-between?

Chrissy, are you comparing that to Waterman Tender Purple? In your sample it looks incredible blue!

Yes, that's my old original bottle of Waterman Purple. However, with purple shades, it's much more difficult to get the main colour as well as all of the comparisons correct. I'll get the sheet out and have a look before it goes dark

[Chrissy]

No big deal!
Just asking since I like tender purple but love Pelikan purple and this diamine maybe in-between?

NP. I tweaked it so it looks better.

[titrisol]

WOW! looks awesome!
thanks

[Morgaine]

This was one of the first inks I bought from Diamine. Happy Purple! Still my favourite purple.

[DrPenfection]

Lovely color! It looks a spring color. Well done.

[Chrissy]

You're welcome. An aristocratic looking purple.