BlueBlack x Diamine - Light Under Waterloo 1
Light Under Waterloo 1 is probably my favorite of the three inks in the Waterloo Bridge set from the BlueBlack Pen Shop and Diamine. Part of the Art Collection series, the set honors artist Claude Monet.
I like blues that have an intelligent, positive personality and offer variety in shading. Light Under Waterloo 1 checks those boxes. It’s a happy blue, and it makes you think of sunny skies and tropical vacations. It’s tempered and not as bright as some of the popular blues. I don’t always want a really bright blue, but I don’t always want to go as dark as some of my favorite darker blues, and I think this ink sits very nicely in the middle.
A sharp stroke edging on coated papers makes it pop and emphasizes the strong shading from dark to light. On uncoated papers, it wears a more cottony veil, as if thin wisps of cloud drift slowly across the morning sky. It loses its darkened edging, but the nice shading remains. I like both personas. The decisive stroke profile really gives this ink an opinion, and the shading lets it sing.
This is a fairly wet ink with low viscosity. Like all of the inks in the Art Collection sets that I’ve tried, there’s no worries about feather or spread. You may find a bit of ghosting on uncoated papers, but I didn’t have any problem with really dark show-through or bleed, other than the occasional, overly inked spot.
As you can see below, the Art Collection sets are beautifully packaged. They’re available at BlueBlack’s beautiful shop in Seoul, through their website, or on international shopping site GMarket Global (for inexpensive US shipping cost choose “USPS” for your shipping method). You can also find them at PenGallery in Malaysia.
Keep scrolling down for the swatch card, swatch comparisons, the bottles, and the packaged set.
Special thanks to BlueBlack for sending me these inks as a surprise gift! As usual, my reviews reflect my honest opinions, and I always include both the good and bad based on my experience using the ink.