Ink Review: Diamine Sapphire Blue

**Chrissy** · January 9th, 2019, 10:11 PM

Diamine Sapphire Blue is a bright blue ink. It’s a mid range shade that leans slightly purple as many Royal Blue inks tend to do. However Diamine Sapphire Blue is more saturated than many standard Royal Blue inks, although it is less saturated than inks like Cornflower, Tchaikovsky and Majestic Blue.

I wrote my review on Clairefontaine Triomphe smooth coated paper, that is not very absorbent, and I saw no spread, feathering, show-through or bleed-through.

It’s a fairly saturated ink but I still saw some nice shading. It flowed very well with all of the pens I tried it in, felt neither wet nor dry, and lubrication was nicely smooth across the paper.

It seems to look more purple with wetter nibs.

Start-Up: No start-up problems noticed. No skipping noticed.
Dry time: Quick 11-14 seconds on the 90gsm paper.
Nib Dry-out: There was no nib dry-out while I put the uncapped pen down to do the comparison ink tests.
Clogging: No clogging seen. No Nib Creep / “Crud” seen, even after several days in the pen.
Clean-Up: Clean up off of hands and out of pens was very easy.
Waterproof: Diamine Sapphire Blue is not sold as a waterproof ink but exhibits some water resistance.
It is currently available in 30ml plastic or 80ml glass bottles or standard International sized cartridges and is reasonably priced.
Diamine inks sells it directly to end-users on their web-site, and it’s stocked by many retailers worldwide.

Diamine Sapphire Blue.jpeg Diamine Sapphire Blue 1.jpeg

**aurore** · January 10th, 2019, 03:44 AM

A lovely review. Actually I would says it is not less saturated than Tchaikovsky, it looks almost neon to me, however it is lighter and more purple.
Very much agreed regarding flow and lubrication, unlike some other Diamine inks it is not overly wet (gold medal of wetness goes to Midnight or Asa) but flows perfectly nevertheless.

**Chrissy** · January 10th, 2019, 04:56 AM

Originally Posted by aurore

A lovely review. Actually I would says it is not less saturated than Tchaikovsky, it looks almost neon to me, however it is lighter and more purple.
Very much agreed regarding flow and lubrication, unlike some other Diamine inks it is not overly wet (gold medal of wetness goes to Midnight or Asa) but flows perfectly nevertheless.

Thank you.

I keep my Tchaikovsky in a TWSBI inkwell and it always becomes much darker in several of my pens. It's one of my favourite inks.

I always believed that Tchaikovsky was more saturated. The printed lines on that review form are much darker/heavier than those on this review form, yet Sapphire Blue didn't cover the faint printed lines on this form.

**aurore** · January 10th, 2019, 04:38 PM

Thank you, this makes sense

Yet I still believe a colour can be rather light but more saturated than a dark colour, but I am mainly applying gemstones grading approach so I can be wrong. In fact either more or less saturated, sapphire is a great ink and so is your review, thank you again!