Kyo Iro Bottled Fountain Pen Ink (40mL) - Stone Road of Gion

i've had this inked up in my platinum cool (medium nib) since i got it and i'm very pleased with this combination: it's fine enough for everyday writing (i use it for journaling; it works great in my stalogy) while still showing a good amount of shading. i haven't yet tried it in anything finer, but i'm not sure i will; that shading is too lovely.

the name suits the colour well; alternatively, i'd describe it as a cool-toned, slightly desaturated/muted medium brown. i think it is a bit of a drier ink, but i personally prefer that over potential ink blobs and smears. i've noticed some hard starts when i start using it each day, but i can't confirm if it's the ink or the pen. once the ink is flowing, i haven't seen any issues with skipping (but i also write slowly, which probably factors in as well).

overall very happy with this purchase, and i'm excited to try other colours from this brand!

Beautiful packaging, but the inkflow is problematic. I first tried this ink with a Pilot Custom 74 w/ a SF nib and was very disappointed. Constant ink flow issues, railroading, skips on downstrokes, all in all a very unpleasant experience. I almost gave up on this ink, but then I tried it in a Montblanc 146 w/ a B nib and it performed much better in that pen. Still not superexcited, because the ink is very undersaturated, and quite watery most of the time, producing very faded lines w/ pale spots, and quite a bit of bleedthrough in cheap paper. And the color is kind of non-descript greyish brown, Wouldn't buy this ink again, but at least it performs ok in the right nib (very wet and broad).

I love this ink in a journal. It's wonderfully expressive in its shading and colour variation with tones of brown and green. A page written with it looks like an artifact. It's worked equally well with a wet 1.1 stub and with a fine dry Platinum nib. Probably not best as a utilitarian every-day sort of ink because the tone isn't reliable, but to me, that variability makes it great for personal writing.

The colour of this ink is really quite interesting. An earthy gold – brown (?) that’s not so easy to describe. I’m not sure if it’s unique, but it’s definitely not usual. And the bottle and packaging very nicely complement the ink. The downside is that the ink is pretty dry. To the point that there can be difficulty writing with it. The first couple pens I tried it with, there was skipping and hard starts. Even with a wetter pen (Lamy M) it seems to drag a bit, which makes writing just slightly unpleasant, even when ink flow is acceptable. I still like the colour (which is the only reason I gave it two stars instead of one).