Lamy Dark Lilac: You would be surprised at how much inks can vary

Lamy Dark Lilac: You would be surprised at how much inks can vary

Once again, the fountain pen community was in uproar over the latest “re-release” of Lamy’s Dark Lilac ink in early 2024. This resulted in an article in The New York Times and a barrage of angry social media posts which once again highlighted how volatile the fountain pen community can be. SBRE Brown made a very timely video on his YouTube channel declaring that he wanted no part in these arguments and the associated “outrage” but did request that fountain pen users take this all with a pinch of salt, because in the big scheme of things, a slightly different ink isn’t that big of a big deal.

What was this all about then?

In 2016 Lamy released a limited edition Dark Lilac ink, which some people apparently liked.

In 2024 Lamy released an ink by the same name, however this was not an identical ink to the 2016 limited edition.

Here is the inflammatory photo from The New York Times’ article:

Whilst I can say that (to me) these do look like different inks, I’ll ask you to remember that the 2016 version was a limited edition ink… Just in case anyone is unclear about what “limited edition” means, let me briefly inksplain it to you: This was a one-off production of an ink which was to be available for a limited time only, until stocks “ran dry”

Yes, these are indeed two different inks. Over the years (and more recently, especially) I have seen a wide range of limited edition inks come and go - That’s the nature of these limited edition inks. Once they’re gone, they’re gone.

If you love one of these limited edition inks, by all means stockpile your own supply, but never expect it to return to the market.

In my opinion, Lamy ought to have called this new Dark Lilac ink something else to avoid confusion, but for whatever reason, Lamy decided to “re-release” Dark Lilac.

Following on from this furore, Lamy stated that one or more of the ink’s ingredients was no longer available, therefore they had to change the formulation, resulting in a different (yet somewhat similar) dark lilac ink.

This debacle made me think about inks in general and it’s time for you to ask yourself the following question:

If you bought a replacement bottle of ink for your collection, would it be exactly the same as your previous bottle?

This question leads me on to my next topic: Ink Variations

There are a number of potential reasons for a change in ink colours:

1. I’ve seen vintage bottles of Quink being sold for silly money because some people only want to write with the original colour. Ink formulations change due to raw materials either being unavailable or unsuitable, or new processes meaning that the manufacturing process has to be changed.

2. Inks in general do not “go off” as long as they are stored in sealed bottles, out of direct light and at relatively low ambient temperatures. (Avoiding contaminating bottled inks by inserting “dirty” objects (e.g. filthy dirty pen sections covered in grubby fingerprints) into them also helps.)

However, some inks may degrade through one or more of these processes and the oxidisation and inevitable evaporation over time will result in a potential change of colour.

3. Ink batches and variations in ink colours - This is where Lamy “Dark Lilac” sits.

If you buy paint, yarn, or any other material which is coloured, it’s a good idea to make sure that you buy the same batch number. Variations between batch numbers of the exact same product can and do vary, but fountain pen inks never appear to have batch numbers! Don’t believe me? Go into your nearest hobby store and look at balls of yarn: Find one colour and check the batch number. Now find the same coloured yarn but with a different batch number and compare the two. The colour will be very similar, but different enough to be noticeable if the two batches are combined into one product, e.g. a blanket.

Noodler’s inks are an excellent example of small batch runs which vary a lot between batches: Years ago I saw WaskiSquirrel use Noodler’s Black Swan in Australian Roses - I loved the dark purple colour with some remarkable, almost black, shading… The bottle that I subsequently bought was just a plain old purple with hardly any dark shading and not any of the lovely black that I’d seen in these videos.

If you were to compare two bottles of “identical” inks, bought several years apart, I am fairly certain that you will see that the colours really aren’t identical, unless they were mass produced by a mainstream ink manufacturer, such as Lamy… Or maybe not.

The fact that people expected Lamy Dark Violet to be the exact same ink caused this drama, but inks do vary - just sayin'

Of course, this may result in Lamy selling more bottles of Dark Lilac because of this "negative" promotion. I for one was aware that there was a Lamy Purple ink, but I wasn't aware that Dark Lilac was a "new" ink!

It's not an ink for me because I already possess plenty of inks and I am trying to work my way through these.

If I had bought 2024 Dark Lilac, expecting the 2016 version, would I have been disappointed? Probably not. Would I have become angry about it? Absolutely not! I have bought some bloody awful inks in my time (TroubleMaker Inks, I'm looking at you right now) and I now know after more than 6 years of using fountain pens what inks I will like, and which inks I know that I should avoid.

I'd advise people to manage their expectations on this subject.

However, I don't feel that Lamy taking to Instagram to fan these flames was a good idea. This week, Lamy has really damaged their stance on this drama with their admittedly inflammatory Instagram posts. Not a good idea at all, and it makes no sense to me why they would even post these on social media.

But hey! One more thing - that seems to have largely been ignored: Lamy has also just been sold to the Mitsubishi Pencil Company, rapidly following the sale of Pelikan to Hamelin last year...

Those bits of news are noteworthy and potentially are of some cause for concern, but as with most things in this world these days, people are fighting over a slight variation in an ink, whilst the parent company may potentially change drastically in the coming months and years.