Oblation Papers & Press Portland Rain
Ink Review #128
*Please note that the scan is the accurate representation of this color.
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Overview
The color:
Oblation Portland Rain is a deep, moody grey with slight purple and pink undertones. It shades with a soft cut between its light and dark tones in both cursive and print. Depending on the wetness of the pen, the slight pink tones come out most noticeably where the shading cuts off.
Ink Splat
Droplets
Performance on paper:
Portland Rain was well-behaved and didn’t exhibit any traces of bleeding or feathering on any of my test sheets. It should be fine on most fountain-pen friendly papers.
This ink had average dry times, mostly falling within the 15-20 second range with the large nib sizes and 5-10 seconds with the finer nibs.
The water resistance was surprisingly good, and while there was still some slight color loss and slight clouding after water exposure, the remains are still dark and crisp enough to be easily legible.
Water resistance
Chromatography
Performance in the pen:
Portland Rain has a consistent medium flow that feels well-lubricated enough to provide for a comfortable writing experience. I didn’t experience any hard starts, stops, or skips during my tests.
The cleaning experience was easy, and it only took a single soak and flush to clean the ink from the test pen and nib units without any lingering color or residue.
Written on 52gsm Tomoe River Paper with a Pelikan fine nib (writes like a medium)
Written on Midori MD white with Pelikan fine nib (writes like a medium)
Performance in a pen: 9/10
Performance on paper: 10/10
Color saturation: 6/10
Sheening: 0/10
Shading: 5/10
Dry time: 7.5/10
Water resistance: 4/10
Ease of cleaning: 10/10
Shimmer: None
Sarah’s thoughts…
As I write this, spring is in full swing here in Oregon, which means that the weather outside resembles this ink in every way, both inside the bottle and on the page (an effect captured beautifully in this sticker designed as a companion piece for the ink). It’s called Portland Rain but this gloomy, dreary grey is characteristic of most of western Oregon during our rainy season (it’s both a meme and frequently a fact that this season lasts for 8-9 months of the year, from October to June). Besides being overall wonderful to write with, I was particularly struck by the subtle pink and dark lavender tones of the ink in the bottle — a moody grey alone would have been good, but these pale tones are what make it so Oregon to me. Rain clouds in a bottle. They don’t show up much in normal writing, which mostly shades between a darker and lighter grey, but they can be visible in some swatches.
Portland Rain is my favorite grey ink. Maybe this is a weird thing to say but out of all four Oblation inks (and I love all of them), this one brings me the most joy because for me, it resembles something familiar and comforting. It reminds me of heavy, overcast skies. Big fat raindrops plopping on leaves. Evergreen mountains and hills enshrouded in mist.
It feels like home.
Written in an A5 GoodINKPressions 52 gsm Tomoe River Notebook (Cursive), and a Midori MD Traveler’s Company notebook insert (white, print) with a Pelikan M620 Place de la Concorde (fine)
More images/info:
Featured in the photography and writing samples:
Oblation Papers & Press Portland Rain
Pelikan M620 Place de la Concorde, fine nib
Good Inkpressions 52 gsm A5 Tomoe River notebook
Midori A6 lined notebook (Amazon)
Chic Sparrow Outlander A6 leather notebook cover
Wearingeul Ink Drop swatch card
Franklin-Christoph Suit Grey pen roll
Portland Leather Storm and Aqua Leather Wrap Journals, small
Lego 31147 Retro Camera (Amazon)
More rainy day-themed inks:
Tools and materials used in the writing samples:
A TWSBI Diamond 580 AL with 7 nib units including a Needlepoint grind, EF, F, M, B, 1.1mm stub, and an Architect grind. All nibs are tuned to perform at the same medium wetness.
A Rhodia No16 A5 DotPad
A Leuchtturm1917 A5 Notebook
A Midori MD A5 Notebook
A 52gsm A5 Tomoe River Notebook
A Maruman Mnemosyne A5 Spiral Notebook
A Kokuyo Campus A5 Notebook
