on saleJacques Herbin Poussiere de Lune - 30ml Bottled Ink

This is a well 'behaved' ink and a very soft pretty color

Herbin Poussiere de Lune is a lovely, complex hue in the purple-plum-mauve range. It flows well in my TWSBI Vac Iris (medium nib) and dries fairly quickly. The color is neither muddy nor vivid � it is quite appealing � a good choice when a brightly-colored ink might not be appropriate. I cannot detect any hint of "brownishness." I'd say the saturation is mid-range. Poussiere de Lune coordinates well with my pen, too. I've been pleased with all my Herbin inks. I gave this one 4 stars instead of 5 merely because I do prefer more vivid inks, not because of any perceived defect. If you like the color, go for it! (It's also a great value.)

flows nice looks nice but if you're buying it for the vintage desaturated look of the sample it's more vibrant than that at least it was for me

There is a certain aesthetic that might be familiar if you've read the wonderful Petit Nicolas books by Ren� Goscinny or Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans. It is the world of S�y�s ruled paper, flex nib fountain pens, Duploy� shorthand... in short, we're talking about fee-paying boarding schools in France, especially in the Fifties and Sixties.Poussi�re de Lune, by Herbin, is synonymous with this world. It was, and remains, EVERYBODY'S ink and any self-respecting Frenchman will be familiar with it. It should be noted that, even though it's Purple with a capital P, this isn't at all a feminine sort of colour: it's entirely work or school appropriate, and, speaking from the male perspective, you won't "stand out" in a bad way if you make this your daily ink. I'd liken this to the borders of the Roman toga praetexta (worn by magistrates and holders of high office) or Tyrian purple.For sheer nostalgia points, it earns five stars. For anyone interested in the nostalgia factor, the trans-Channel equivalent would be the royal blue registrar's ink used in the offices of British lawyers (fun fact: it's guaranteed indelible). That said, the nostalgia factor does not distract from the pure fact that this is a technically excellent ink. Its flaws, such as they are, are that the formulation is slow-drying (allow thirty seconds to avoid smudges), very wet, and that it feathers like an ostrich. This ink REQUIRES good paper and a fine pen (I use a flex nib with it). Coarse stub nibs need not apply. Poussi�re de Lune was the inspiration for Rohrer and Klinger Scabiosa, so if you like the latter, you'll love the former (subject to the foregoing caveats). Note that it bleeds at the first whiff of moisture, so you might want to make sure your hands are dry. The ink is odour-free, smudge-free, with a fair bit of shading but no sheen at all. For the pleasure of writing, Herbin's Poussi�re de Lune is second to none. It gets my five-star rating. Technically, it's excellent. There's room for improvement but it's four stars at worst.

This is my favorite ink. It's purple, but can look red, pink, brown, or even gray or black, depending on circumstances. It has lots of shading. It's easy on the eyes to read back. I use a TWSBI Eco in Lilac with this ink, and it's a pretty good color match once the ink is down on paper. It's extremely well-behaved. It writes well on all of the fountain pen-friendly paper I've tried writing with it on so far -- Clairfontaine 90 gsm, Black n' Red Optik paper, Ink and Volt planner paper, and Leuchtturm1917. It's also behaved well on the non-fountain pen friendly paper I've tried it on so far -- Wexford and Rite Aid brand regular notebooks, recycled copy paper (with only a tiny bit of bleedthrough on the copy paper), and uncoated birthday cards. It did not work well on coated/waxy birthday cards, but I don't really expect any fountain pen to on that material. It writes wet, smooth, and reliably, though it is not a gusher. It does not leak from the nib or have a lot of nib creep like some other inks do. It's extremely easy to clean out of pens with just water, and supposedly non-toxic and ph neutral. The price is great for what you get. I would recommend this ink without reservation to new fountain pen users (I'm still very new myself) who want a color other than plain black, as well as to more experienced fountain pen people who want a nice color that is interesting but reliable, with lots of shading. I only have two minor complaints, and the first isn't really fair. First, I wish this ink was waterproof because if it was, I would rarely use another color. But it is not advertised as, nor expected to be waterproof, so I don't feel that is truly a valid complaint.My second complaint is not about the ink itself, but about the bottle. I mostly like the way the bottle looks, though the lack of symmetry bothers me, but it isn't very practical. The bottle has a pen rest on the front of the bottle, but the rest is too small for even a relatively thin fountain pen (the Pilot Metropolitan), so it isn't useful, and really only serves to take up space that could be used for ink. It also probably makes the ink more expensive to sell, whereas a non-custom bottle would probably make it cheaper. But much more than that, the J. Herbin regular series ink bottles are short and squat, which makes them easier to fit in small spaces, but it makes filling normal sized pens with them extremely difficult. I'm always afraid I'll damage my nib by unexpectedly jabbing it on the botton of the bottle, and when even a relativey small amount of ink is used out of the bottle, the pen becomes extremely hard to fill. Goulet pens does sell products like ink wells, vials, and blunt tip syringes to make pens easier to fill, and I'm planning on picking some of those up soon. I appreciate that Goulet pens sells them, but it would be nice if J. Herbin made more user-friendly bottles. But that is my only quibble, and a small one. If you are new, just be careful and gentle when you insert your pen into the bottle for filling.