Diamine Ancient Copper: Ink Review

Part of the standard line of Diamine fountain pen inks, Diamine Ancient Copper is a gorgeous copper colored ink with heavy shading ink that has a reasonable dry time and a lot of personality. Read ahead to find out more!

Ink Review 

Supplies Used:

• LAMY safari with medium steel nib
• Rhodia No. 16 dot pad, 80g white paper
• Tomoé River 52 gsm white paper
• Leuchtturm1917 80g notebook

Smear Test (Dry Time):

• 20~ seconds – This ink dries in a reasonable time frame, generally by 20 seconds, but with a more wet nib it may take a second or two longer.

Drip Test (Water Resistance):

• Low – This isn't water resistant so while not ideal for addressing envelopes or important documents it has a lot of personality and works great for notes and art work.

Saturation:

• Medium– It definitely has some shading but the depth of the orange to red tones keeps it feeling pretty saturated and allows for those 20~ second dry times.

Ease of Cleaning:

• High – Ancient Copper is not water resistant and tends to clean out easily from pens. Just be careful of leaving for it longer periods of time without use as it can form some easily cleanable but dubious looking 'crust bubbles' on the nib.

Shading:

• High – This ink has a lot of personality and goes from a deep red/brown to light orange with a tinge of yellow. Highly versatile and gives a flair to most writing!

Flow:

• Wet – Ancient Copper has a good flow and like most Diamine inks it is pretty wet. However, it still holds up well to all fountain pen friendly paper we used.

 Packaging and Aesthetics:

• Diamine uses a unique design for their 80ml bottles featuring an almost square base with glass bubbles along the rounded top. The 30ml bottles are plastic with a narrow neck and flip top, they aren't easy to fill from so we recommend decanting into an inkwell.

If you're interested in similar colors, check out our Swab Shop where you can compare colors side by side.

Summary:

Overall, Ancient Copper checks a lot of boxes for someone looking for an ink with for a unique color with depth, personality, shading and is low maintenance. If this sounds like the ink for you, check out the options in the links below!

This color is available in 80ml and 30ml bottles as well as our 2ml samples.