Pairings Party: Waldmann Xetra Vienna, Amarillo Stationery Azul Frida

I did my first pairings party a few weeks back with the Onoto Scholar and Ferris Wheel Press Central Park Greens, and this week I’m back with another matchy-matchy combination that I’m loving in the Waldmann Xetra Vienna and Amarillo Stationery Azul Frida.

Beginning with the Waldmann, the Xetra Vienna puts the brand’s craftsmanship on full display. I knew this pen was a stunner with its polished blue lacquer and platinum plated parts, but I had no idea the cap pattern was hand-engraved. Not only does it look amazing, but it makes each pen in this series unique.

The Xetra Vienna is a standard length fountain pen, but with a narrow diameter. This shape leads to a requisitely narrow grip section, and #5-sized nib. My review model features an 18k Fine gold nib, but there is a stainless steel option as well.

This narrow barrel fits right into my preferences for writing. While I am comfortable using many pen shapes and sizes, I do prefer the narrow side of the ledger, so keep that in mind when I tell you how much I enjoy writing with this pen. Those who prefer bigger, wider pens may want to wait and see about the next Waldmann I will be reviewing.

I’ve had the Xetra Vienna in my writing rotation for a few weeks now, and it has been great. The added weight of the metal barrel balances out the narrowness, making for a comfortable writer. I mixed in a longer copy writing session for my long-running “The Bone Weaver’s Orchard” project, and the feel of the pen removed itself completely from the occasion. It morphed into my hand, the ink flow never stopped, and I had nothing to think about other than the text I was reading, and writing.

It was a great experience.

Adding to the writing experience was the perfect match of Pennonia Azul Frida, made for Amarillo Stationery. Inspired by Casa Azul, the long-time home of artist Frida Kahlo, this is a classic, bright blue that will feel right at home in any pen, especially one as perfect as the Xetra Vienna.

I’ve used a couple of Pennonia Inks, and the consistent performance of Azul Frida matches my experience with the rest. Great flow, excellent color saturation, and good dry time - all universally loved ink properties. As a bonus, what looks like a basic blue has hints of purple underneath, as seen in some of the ink swatches on different paper types - Yamamoto Bank Paper, for example.

I always want a classic blue on hand, and one with and added story and added character, like Azul Frida, is right up my alley.

Top to bottom: Sailor King of Pen Sky, Platinum 3776 Chartres Blue, Waldmann Xetra Vienna, Lamy 2000 Stainless Steel.

My first experience with Waldmann was last year, when Kimberly let me test out one of hers. In general, the designs of this 100 year-old German brand aren’t a perfect style match for myself, but my goodness was the writing experience nice. That alone put them on my radar, especially as they continue to release interesting models.

The Xetra Vienna runs $319 with a steel nib, and $439 with an 18k gold nib, as seen in this review. The price feels right for the level of quality and craftsmanship. And Waldmann has well over a dozen different styles to choose from, ranging from $200 on up. While I don’t have one in my collection today, it won’t me long before one makes the cut and I add it to list.

(Luxury Brands of America loaned the Waldmann to The Pen Addict. Amarillo Stationery provided the ink at no charge.)

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Pennonia Méregzöld - Seafoam or Poison?

(Kimberly (she/her) took the express train down the fountain pen/stationery rabbit hole and doesn't want to be rescued. She can be found on Instagram @allthehobbies because there really are many, many hobbies!.)

Pennonia is a company founded by Hungarian fountain pen enthusiast Máté Bikfalvi who decided to launch his own line of inks in early 2020. There are currently over 40 different inks, not including exclusives like Inkdependence’s Cheerio Waterbus. I will be reviewing Pennonia Méregzöld, which we received for review from Vanness Pens.

Back in the day, Máté’s family computer had a seafoam teal Windows 95 background. Máté’s mom thought it looked like méregzöld, which is Hungarian for “poison green”. So when this dark teal ink was created, the name was an obvious choice and Pennonia Méregzöld was born. Pro tip: if you want to learn how to pronounce the name of this and other Pennonia inks, head over to this helpful pronunciation page

Pennonia Méregzöld comes in a 50ml glass bottle which is packaged in a white box with a round color swatch on top which I find super helpful for locating colors in my ink drawers.

Unlike Mike’s Cheerio Waterbus which is a little more green, Méregzöld leans a bit more blue. It is a fairly saturated ink that has average to slightly wet flow in the Broad Stub.

Similar inks include Diplomat Caribbean, Stilo e Stile Roman Bronze Oxidation, Sailor 2022 Pen Show Ink and Robert Oster Aqua.

Dry times were pretty fast on more porous paper like the Hamelin index card, but was upwards of 30 seconds on 68 gsm Tomoe River paper and more than 60 seconds to fully dry on 52 gsm. If you want faster dry times, consider a finer nib, dryer nib/feed and less coated paper or all of the above.

Dries pretty quickly on this Hamelin index card.

Dry times on 68 gsm Tomoe River. The Broad Stub is a bit of a wet writer but it definitely takes a while to dry, unless you write with the nib upside down which usually has a drier flow.

Dry times on 52 gsm Tomoe River - not surprising that this takes even longer to dry.

I have had Pennonia Méregzöld inked up in a Newton Prospector with a Franklin-Christoph Nagahara Broad Stub nib for the past 3 months and it always starts up right away even if I haven’t written with the pen/ink in a few weeks. It is a lovely shade of teal that reminds me of the ocean. I picked it because it pairs beautifully with this Earth Magic material from Jonathon Brooks.

Pennonia Méregzöld in a Newton Prospector in Earth Magic with a Broad Stub on 68 gsm Tomoe River.

Brooks’ materials are stunning and this is no exception. I absolutely love it when I find a good ink to match.

Pennonia Méregzöld sells for $13 USD for a 50 ml bottle, which is a good price for a nice amount of ink. I don’t care what the name really means, because Méregzöld definitely is not poison green but a beautiful teal ink that I am really enjoying using.

(Vanness Pens provided this product at a discount to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)

Pennonia Cheerio Waterbus Ink Review

(Kimberly (she/her) took the express train down the fountain pen/stationery rabbit hole and doesn't want to be rescued. She can be found on Instagram @allthehobbies because there really are many, many hobbies!.)

“See you later, Cheerio Waterbus” - what the heck, Kimberly? That doesn’t even rhyme! I know, I know! There are “goodbye phrases” that rhyme in English like “See you later, alligator” and “In a while, crocodile”, but did you know that other languages have similar rhyming sayings for “see ya”? If you check out this Twitter post by Adam Sharp, you’ll find foreign language equivalents including the Dutch’s “Aju paraplu” (“bye umbrella”) or Basque’s “Agur yogur” (“bye yogurt”), but the one that we’re talking about today is “Szervusz vízibusz” which is Hungarian for “cheerio waterbus”! Mike Matteson of Inkdependence thought that was cool and it would be a great name for his ink collaboration with Hungarian ink maker, Máté Bikfalvi of Pennonia Inks.

Released just a few weeks ago in late March, Pennonia x Inkdependence Cheerio Waterbus’ first online batch sold out on the same day and the remaining inks were gone before Saturday afternoon at the Atlanta Pen Show! I was glad I was able to pick up my ink from him at the show before they were all gone! (Don’t worry, more is coming)

Cheerio Waterbus comes in a 60ml glass bottle which is packaged in a white box with Mike’s logo on the side and a round color swatch on top (I love this so I can see what colors are in my ink drawers). The bottle also has a nice swatch on the front, Mike’s logo on the right and “Thanks for choosing Pennonia ink” in Hungarian on the left.

Don’t ignore this advice! You really need to shake it like a Polaroid picture!

There’s a reason you gotta shake the bottle. There is a layer of blue pigment at the bottom.

On Col-o-ring cards, you can see that it is a nice green-leaning teal mixed with blue pigment, which makes the ink shift colors depending on how much pigment you get when you’re writing. You can see the pops of blue in the swatches and the writing sample. I used a Kakimori brass dip nib on the swatch cards. For the other writing samples, I started out with a Leonardo Momento Zero Grande in Caraibi, which is a really great match for all the variations of green and blue that you get from Cheerio Waterbus.

Similar inks include Robert Oster Tranquility, 3 Oysters Aqua Green, Colorverse Morning Star and Robert Oster Marine. These are all just a teensy bit more blue than Cheerio Waterbus. I color-corrected this picture so the swatches would be more accurate, but it makes the Col-O-Ring cards look more yellow.

Pigmented inks can be (but aren’t always) difficult to clean and possibly stain, so I decided to unink my Leonardo Caraibi, which has a captured converter. I only had it in the pen for a day but I didn’t have any problems cleaning it out, other than constantly twisting the converter because that’s the only way to clean these kinds of pens. I switched to a Levenger True Writer, Teal Appeal, so I could use a converter and not worry about any staining (so far so good). Both have Fine European-sized nibs, but the Leonardo writes wetter due to the larger nib/feed, so I was able to see more blue in that writing sample. As with any pen inked up with a pigmented ink like Cheerio Waterbus (or with shimmer inks), you should periodically agitate it to make sure the pigment is mixed well with the dye. Tip: You can agitate a pen with pigment or shimmer by gently rocking it back and forth a few times (nib down, then up, then down, repeat), rolling it around on the table (with the cap on in case of impending gravity!), shaking it gently, or moving the converter piston up and down a few times in combination with other methods.

The wetter pen (top) got me more blue.

Just look at the green, teal and blue in that swatch!

The color shifting wasn’t as noticeable on 24lb copy paper.

The flow is average to slightly wet but it still dried fairly quickly with the Levenger on the index card. On 68 gsm Tomoe River paper, it took a bit longer, especially with the Leonardo, probably 10 seconds more.

Dry time was 25-30 seconds on this Exacompta index card (yay, I found some white ones!)

Now, I know this isn’t meant to be a waterproof or water-resistant ink but since the blue is pigmented, I was curious to see how it would behave if doused with water.

Writing on 24lb copy paper and letting it dry completely before running it under water.

Definitely not waterproof but might be readable if there was more space between the letters.

This is a great ink that flows well and is a great color with super cool blue popping in and out. Mike tells me that he will be getting the next batch in 2 more weeks, so keep an eye out on his Inkdependence IG and his store.

(I purchased this directly from Mike and picked it up at the Atlanta Pen Show.)