Tono & Lims One Year Anniversary "Sun" Ink: A Review

(Susan M. Pigott is a fountain pen collector, pen and paperholic, photographer, and professor. You can find more from Susan on her blog Scribalishess.)

Tono & Lims is a South Korean ink company that ink enthusiasts in the west are getting to know, thanks to newfound availability at stores like Shigure Inks. Brad and Jeff have posted reviews on two other colors of Tono & Lims. Now it's my turn.

Sun is an ink that Tono & Lims produced to celebrate their first anniversary. It's a pink-orange color that fluoresces in ultraviolet light. It's not as subtle as the color I call coral because of its fluorescent properties. It's hard to capture the exact hue in photographs.

On my Col-o-dex card, the ink is pretty flat, exhibiting little shading and a tiny amount of sheen in the ink splats.

On Rhodia white paper, the fluorescent orange is bright, but there's little shading and no sheen. It is not waterproof and dries quickly.

Chromatography shows that pink is the primary color in this ink. If you look closely, you'll see a light band of fluorescent green.

I don't own a black light, so I can't show you what the ink looks like in the ultraviolet spectrum. However, you can see the fluorescence when the ink interacts with water.

My ruling pen brought out the best of the ink, demonstrating some shading and a bit of green sheen.

Fools Cap paper tamed the ink into a more standard coral color, absorbing the fluorescent properties. It makes a pretty mandala, though!

Tono & Lims "Sun" is an interesting ink. I appreciate ink companies that do something unusual with their inks, and fluorescent ink is a new concept for me. That said, I'm not crazy about this color, and I'm not sure what fluorescent ink has to offer. The last time I owned a black light was in Junior High, so it's hard for me to find a practical use for the ink without one. Nevertheless, I'm intrigued by Tono & Lims and plan to try other colors soon.

You can purchase a 30ml bottle of Sun from Shigure Inks for $22.00. That's a bit on the expensive side (though Sailor Ink Studio is $18 for 20ml), so you might want to order samples first before you commit to an entire bottle.

(The Pen Addict purchased this ink at full retail from Shigure Inks.)

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Tono & Lims #11 Fountain Pen Ink Review

(Jeff Abbott is a regular contributor at The Pen Addict. You can find more from Jeff online at Draft Evolution and Twitter.)

In a hobby where "not enough" ink variety can quickly turn into "OMG, way too many inks," I can honestly say that I wish I had more purple inks in my collection. The same is true of green inks. For me, that's just where my eye is drawn right now. Maybe I'm just craving happy, bright colors in a world that's otherwise dark and cruel, but all I know is that a little pop of color during the day helps me keep moving forward. The latest purple ink that I've had the pleasure of using is Tono & Lims #11.

If you've never heard of this little ink shop, you're not alone. The company is fairly well-known and popular in South Korea, and they have quite a collection of inks for being relatively obscure (in the US market, at least). 11 is a pale purple that I've had extreme feelings about so far. As far as I can remember, I've never gone back and forth on liking and disliking an ink so many times. Is this ink trying to be purple or gray? Is it so light on purpose, or is that to showcase the lovely shading characteristic even more? While it's certainly not one of my favorite inks for everyday use, I've really enjoyed using it and seeing how it acts on different papers and in different sized nibs.

Let's get the obvious out of the way: This ink is extremely watery and light. Until I looked up other ink samples online, I was second-guessing if I'd accidentally left some water in the pen after cleaning it, resulting in a less saturated and thin ink. Alas, #11 is light on purpose. Being so watery, it does best on coated papers, like Rhodia, Clairefontaine, Leuchtturm1917, and so on. I tried using this ink on some cheap copy paper and a Baron Fig notebook, and the results were disastrous. The ink bled and veined like crazy on these more absorbent papers, but they also dried in a couple of seconds. It's an odd ink in how it behaves, but that's part of the allure for me. That being said, it's not a great daily driver for use in an office or if your favorite paper is highly absorbent.

The second thing that really confused me besides the really watery nature of this ink is the low saturation of the coloring. At times, it looks like a pale purple highlighter ink. And based on the beautiful Instagram feed from Tono & Lims, I wouldn't be surprised if people use #11 primarily as a shading or background color for larger pieces of art or illustrations. It's a lovely light color, but it just doesn't pop off the page. When writing with this ink on a blank page, the color is delightfully understated and calm. But, if you add even a touch of brighter color, #11 gets washed out completely and looks quite drab.

My favorite behavior from this ink so far is the immense shading capabilities. The differences between gray-purple and light see-through purple are marvelous. Again, it's all very subdued and easy to miss, but it's really well done and I love watching the ink pool up on certain pen strokes.

Another positive behavior with this ink is the incredibly quick dry time. In most cases, it's dry in ten seconds — fifteen if the ink has pooled up a bit. For left-handed writers, this is a fantastic quality. Still, given the pale color, it's not well-suited to everyday or office use.

The full lineup of inks from Tono & Lims looks really interesting and unique, and I'm really excited to see more of these hit our shores. While #11 isn't my favorite ink color, it still has a special place in my collection that I'll certainly break out semi-regularly to enjoy the subtle and delicate purple-gray tones it offers. You can pick up your own 30ml bottle from Shigure Inks. At $22 USD, it's not a fantastic deal, but this is a fairly reasonable and common size/price ratio for imported inks from small independent shops. I'm excited to try more from this interesting brand!

(The Pen Addict purchased this ink at full retail from Shigure Inks.)

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Tono & Lims Fukuoka: Fidelity Ink Review

I’m surprised at how much I like the color of Tono & Lims Fukuoka: Fidelity. But what color is it? I think it is more Watermelon Shaved Ice than Strawberry Popsicle, but I think that’s the range we are playing in. A range I have never dabbled in before.

In general, I like pink inks. Maybe even love them. But the pink inks I like the most have to be bright, vibrant, saturated, and strong. I’ve never found much use for lighter shades of pink, mostly - I think - due to my note taking style of writing, as opposed to journaling, letter writing, or other long forms of expressive writing.

Or it’s all just an excuse to not experiment, which is not a good excuse at all!

When I went ink shopping a few weeks ago, I browsed through some of the swabs at Shigure Inks to find a few shades to try out that were out of my norm. Yes, I bought a blue black and a bright blue, but I tried to mix in something out of my wheelhouse a bit. Fukuoka: Fidelity fit the bill perfectly.

This shade of pink is quite a jump in color range from my normal favorite pink, Califolio Andrinope. Andrinople is more of a hot pink/magenta, which I love, while Fukuoka: Fidelity is more of a fruit-colored pink. Neither is a dusty/flowery pink, which is a shade I’m apparently working my way towards.

I inked it up in my Pilot Custom 92 with a Broad Cursive Italic nib to help show of the character of this color, which it has more of than I thought. The darkest shades are bright, evoking the ripe center of a watermelon, before toning down a shade or two, as if you were working your way down to the rind.

Too specific of a description? Yeah, probably so. But I like this ink! I won’t be eating it, or drinking it, or anything but writing with it, but I am having fun with it. That’s my favorite feature of any ink.

Tono & Lims is a new brand for me, and one of the dozens (hundreds?) of Asian ink brands (T&L is from South Korea) out there that are just now becoming accessible to the rest of the world. My first experience has been very positive, as the ink has been easy to use. It flows well, has moderate shading, dries quickly, and cleans well. It doesn’t have any of the more extreme ink features, like heavy sheen, but that’s not an ink feature I want all the time. This is an ink I can use all day, every day.

After using Fukuoka: Fidelity and enjoying it as much as I have, I’m ready to dabble a little more in the Tono & Lims ink catalog. I also sent off a couple of bottles to the review crew, so I’ll be interested in their colors and what they have to say about them.

(I purchased this ink from Shigure Inks at full retail price.)

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Enjoy reading The Pen Addict? Then consider becoming a member to receive additional weekly content, giveaways, and discounts in The Pen Addict shop. Plus, you support me and the site directly, for which I am very grateful.

Membership starts at just $5/month, with a discounted annual option available. To find out more about membership click here and join us!