Diamine 150th Anniversary ink: Golden Honey (40 mL)

This is my first Diamine ink and I'm so impressed with the beautiful colour. It's slightly more brown-y than it looks in the photo here. I'm using it in my Lamy All-Star with a medium nib. I notice a little bit of feathering on my Rhodia dot pad, but nothing on my Clairfontaine writing pad. It's very readable and will be a really fun colour for a lot of applications. Very glad to have this in my collection now!

Even if Golden Honey is an earthy colour, it is clear, clean and vibrant. The only similar colour to it in tone in my stash is J. Herbin Ambre de Baltique (Les Essentielles), but the latter has different characteristics and dries to a flat, chalky finish even if it feels smoother under my nibs; I much prefer this Diamine ink. Diamine Amber is brighter, more orange and less brown than Golden Honey.

It’s readable in nibs of all sizes, however, in finer nibs such as my Sailor 1911L 21kt H-EF and H-F, Golden Honey is readable more on blank paper: I find that even the lightly printed dot grid ruling on TR paper to be intrusive. Also, because I don’t find Golden Honey to be a highly saturated ink, the dots annoyingly show through the ink.

There is minimal ghosting only with wet wide nibs on thinner paper; I’ve observed no feathering, no bleedthrough, and experienced no skipping, hard starts or stained converters. The ink dries fairly quickly, probably because the flow runs slightly below average; my nibs don’t feel scratchy, but the ink feels thin under my Sailor nibs, even the wet 1911L 21 kt H-B.

With the right pen and paper combo, this ink has lovely golden sheen and presents a dark brown outline in heavily saturated areas where the ink pools. I would use this ink for markups on black text with very wet nibs on the thinner side, or for highlighting with broader, drier nibs.

I bought this ink to match my Gold TWSBI AL Mini and I am so in love with it. It's like sunshine on hay bales, very summery. It's perfectly legible even in a finer nib and flows very well.