Ink Review: Lamy NeonCoral

I will start by saying that this review was not summoned from the past. No time machine was employed. No ouija boards were used. Nor am I torturing you with a review of an ink that no one could ever get their hands on. This review does not break the Zaxxon rule.*

Fontoplumo unearthed several bottles (you read that correctly, BOTTLES!) of NOS** 2014 Limited Edition Lamy NeonCoral (€7.90) recently and made them available on their web site at the original retail price(!!!).

The bottles of Lamy NeonCoral are 30ml and are cute miniature versions of the larger Lamy 50ml bottle. The bottles include the black ring around the bottle but do not include the blotting tape. Its just a faux tape ring. Very cute though.

NeonCoral really is a bit neon so its a pain to photograph. It’s vivid and bright and more orange-y coral than it photographs. It photographs more pink. C’mon, world… stop messing with me!  It’s really a cool color. And unlike so many other inks. Trust me when I say this. I have a lot of ink.

I was worried that the ink might be too light to write with but in my fine italic stub nib, it is totally legible. It is not one of those inks that is light when wet and then dries darker. It’s pretty much the same color wet and dry, which is nice. I do think its a bit more orange when dry. There’s some shading but not much sheen in the writing. I did see some sheen in the swatch.

NeonCoral is still a limited edition ink and hard to acquire. There are some other options available that are similar. J. Herbin Corail des Tropiques is readily available and a bit more orange-y overall. As with all J. Herbin inks, this one can be a little runny, a bit wetter than other inks. It will feather and bleed on more paper than most. Other, more expensive and potentially more difficult-to-acquire options would be Kobe #12 This Pink Hill and Bungbox Lycoris Red. The Kobe ink is a very close match in terms of color and is a Sailor created ink so it will be very well behaved. Lycoris Red is a bit more red but is glows as bright as NeonCoral. Lycoris Red does have a lovely red sheen.

NeonCoral is a really cool color and shows that Lamy can do smart things when they put their minds to it. It makes up for the less-than-stellar releases from the last few years like the stream of LXs and this year’s AL Bronze and last year’s Safari in black-on-black (what was that about?). Sigh.

So, run, don’t walk, to Fontoplumo right now and snap up those last few bottles of NeonCoral. You won’t regret it.

The Giveaway

And finally, I would never leave you hanging. If you don’t nab a bottle of the ink, don’t sweat it. A sweet Canadian reader gave me a pack of NeonCoral cartridges and I am giving them away to one lucky reader. See below to find out how to enter.

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TO ENTER: Leave a comment below and tell me what color Lamy should make as the next limited edition ink color. Play along and type in something that is an actual color. It makes reading through entries more interesting for me, okay? One entry per person.

If you have never entered a giveaway or commented on the site before, your comment must be manually approved by our highly-trained staff of monkeys before it will appear on the site. Our monkeys are underpaid and under-caffeinated so don’t stress if your comment does not appear right away. Give the moneys some time.

FINE PRINT: All entries must be submitted by 10pm CST on Tuesday, Feb. 5, 2019. All entries must be submitted at wellappointeddesk.com, not Twitter, Tumblr or Facebook, okay? Winner will be announced on Wednesday. Winners will be selected by random number generator from entries that played by the rules (see above). Please include your actual email address in the comment form (where it say “email address”) so that I can contact you if you win. I will not save email addresses or sell them to anyone — pinky swear. If winner does not respond within 7 days, I will draw a new giveaway winner. Shipping via USPS first class only. US and APO/AFO only, sorry.

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Tools:

• Paper: Rhodia Ice No. 18 Lined
• Pens: Dip nib holder with Zebra G titanium nib ($33.50 per 10-pack), Acrylic dip nib pen (Approx. $15), Birmingham Model-A with Nemosine 0.6mm stub ($99)
• Swatches: Col-o-Ring Ink Testing Book ($10) & Col-o-dex Rotary Cards ($15)
• Brush: Princeton Neptune #4 Round ($7.16)
• Ink:  Lamy NeonCoral ($17 for 50ml bottle)

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DISCLAIMER: Some items included in this review were provided free of charge for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

*The NPR podcast “Pop Culture Happy Hour” holds its hosts to the “Zaxxon Rule,” wherein they are forbidden to bring up topics which are unrelatable to the audience, such as events in one’s personal life. (from Wikipedia)

**New old stock