L'Artisan Pastellier Brun Ours (Brown Bear)
Pen: Jinhao x450 (M)
Paper: Rhodia #16 Blank - 80gsm
Shading: moderate to high
Saturation: medium
Flow: moderate
Dry Time: 13 seconds in fairly wet M nib

L'Artisan Pastellier Classique inks are still fairly new on my radar, but so far I'm really liking them a lot. They're made in France, and are hailed for their ability to be freely mixed to form new colors. The first one that I tried was Olive, which has become one of my favorite inks. When I was going through my sample vials and saw Brun Ours, the color caught my attention and I had to try it.

I'm usually not a fan of browns, especially warmer browns, but Brun Ours has more of a greyish tone, which I like a lot. It's not a heavily saturated ink, so it has a fair amount of shading. The ink goes onto the page a warmer, medium-dark brown, and dries a cooler brown with a nice neutral grey tint. The dry time is a tad high at around 13 seconds, but aside from that it behaves quite well with no feathering or bleedthrough on typical fountain pen paper.

One of the best parts of the L'Artisan Pastellier inks is their ease of cleaning. They're not heavily saturated with strong dyes, and in my experience even when having them in my pen for a few weeks they clean out very easily.

The ink compares very closely to De Atramentis Maron. Maron is a tad bit cooler and darker, but they're very close. The chromatography shows mostly black with a tiny bit of pinkish-brown.

L'Artisan Pastellier inks are certainly becoming more and more popular, and rightly so. Their lightly saturated colors, high shading and ability to mix make them unique and fun inks. If you're interested in checking out their other colors or ordering a bottle for yourself, check out Vanness Pens page. You can get a 30mL bottle for $7. What is your favorite L'Artisan Pastellier color?

Thanks for reading!
- Lori