J. Herbin 350th Anniversary Inks

In celebration of J. Herbin’s 350th anniversary, they released a special edition of five of their inks. In beautiful glass bottles, there is a quite large 500mL bottle and a 100mL set, which includes a glass ink dipping well.

There are five colours:
Perle Noire
Violette Pensee
Bleu Myosotis
Rouge Caroubier
Vert Reseda

Interesting ink choices from J. Herbin! I would have guessed they would do Eclat de Saphir, or maybe Lie de The, but I’m sure there are some sort of historical reasons for the inks they have chosen. I think Violette Pensee was used for many decades in the French school system as ink for students. Perhaps these were early inks for the company?

But the bottles look great, as they would when you get to reach back three centuries for inspiration. Each one is sealed with wax. If you’re going to mainly display the bottle, I would suggest trying to find a place that isn’t too sunny. Ink will last a long time, especially if you keep it out of bright light, and who knows, maybe your kids will finally crack open the bottle, decades from now.

We received these bottles what seems like ages ago (maybe...two months?) but they’ve been going in and out of stock and it seems like it’s probably as good as it’s going to get for us in terms of having them all in stock right now, with our last big shipment from J. Herbin.

I love the look of these bottles! I love that J. Herbin has been releasing exciting things over the years. I still remember the excitement of Stormy Grey, back when we were at 906 Dundas West, perhaps our first big release ever. Their inks were some of our first in the shop, and some of my favourites. Their new colours are always great, and I love that there’s something for everyone. My personal favourites are Lie de The, Vert de Gris, and Bleu des Profondeurs.