It’s the final day of Inkvent, and so it’s time to both review the final, 30ml bottle of the set, and review the calendar in its entirety.
Day 25’s ink is a larger, 30ml bottle. It’s called Best Wishes, and it’s a very dark and saturated green with green shimmer and a lot of red sheen.
It’s quite a dramatic combination, the dark green base being almost black, the red sheen being very prominent and the green shimmer on top. More Halloween appropriate perhaps than Christmassy.
My camera had a rough time photographing this ink. It’s the combination of the shimmer and the dark ink maybe that made it a bit blurry. In any case, the base ink is so dark that you can hardly tell that it’s a green at times.
Here it is from another angle:
This ink takes ages to dry, because it’s so saturated. I smudged the sketch above and this writing sample took a good long time to properly dry. If you’re left handed, I’d steer well away from Diamine Best Wishes. If you like the drama, then maybe it’s the ink for you. Personally I would have preferred a lighter or more interesting green with a chameleon effect and no sheen.
It’s summary time! Looking at this year’s Inkvent, I’m very pleased with the selection of inks, the spread of ink properties amongst them, and the overall value of this experience. I like that we got new chameleon inks, and I appreciated that there were less red inks in this year’s edition, and quite a good number of uniquely coloured inks. Reviewing the whole 25 inks involved, I think that Dusted Truffle, Memory Lane, Solar Storm, Ghost, Olive Swirl, Arctic Blast, Deck the Halls, and One More Sleep are the stand outs for me. Olive Swirl, Memory Lane, Dusted Truffle and Deck the Halls are inks that I plan on buying full bottles of once the green edition bottles come out. Ghost and Arctic Blast might join them too. If you like red inks, the Spiced Apple is fantastic. There are other great inks to have here, depending on your personal taste.
It was quite an endeavour, to fill fountain pens 25 times with ink and write, sketch and post a review of an ink a day. I don’t know if Diamine will create a 2023 Inkvent calendar, or if I will be able to write another set of reviews like this, but it was a wild and fun ride creating these reviews for the blog this year.
Merry Christmas to all who celebrate. I hope you got some cool pens and ink under the tree.
Writing at Large 
Pois0n
Nice review!
There are still way too much reds for me (especially since they’re quite close, I mean, Cardinal is close to last year’s Red Robin, Spiced Apple too with with chameleon shimmer…), but the selection was nice. Lots of shimmer so I’m happy (but it might not suit everyone).
I’ll for sure pick full bottles of Solar Storm (like… everyone else? seems nobody dislikes it), Spruce (because that smell ♥♥♥), Serendipity (maybe my fave), Deck the Halls and One More Sleep (that shading, that lovely purpulish blue, I’m in love!).
And yes, the chameleons are quite hard to catch on camera, I struggled with them too!
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writingatlarge
I agree that Cardinal and Red Robin are very similar, but Spiced Apple is unique with its chameleon effect. Quite dramatic and very Inkvent appropriate. I’m glad that they included it, even though I, like you, am not a fan of red inks.
Your ink selection is fantastic!
Thank you for your kind comment. I appreciate it.
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graysummers
Thank you for the perseverance. Seen in photographic entirety is very useful. The red Spiced Apple, the Olive Swirl and the last Best Wishes are the standouts I like. One or two more I could get along with nicely. Your format of using routine presentation was a great idea. And the last observations of a lighter reflective nature were very interesting too. Randomness was avoided, by using a ‘template’, and as viewers we could relax into the reviews you made. Thanks for an enjoyable inky investigation. And good fortune with next years blogs too. All the best.
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writingatlarge
Thank you for your kind words. They really mean a lot to me.
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Derek
I much prefer this year’s selection over last year’s. Quite surprised that you’re planning to buy a full bottle of Deck the Halls since you said in the initial review that you don’t like the base colour and won’t be purchasing a bottle.
Anyway, thanks for all the reviews, much appreciated!
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