Ink Swatch Wednesday: Pilot Iroshizuku Syun-Gyo

For some unknown reason, I was so anticipating the arrival of Pilot Iroshizuku Syun-Gyo that once it became available at Vanness, I ordered a bottle of it instead of waiting to be able to pick up a sample. I guess the couple videos I watched on YouTube made the ink look so appealing that I figured, "hell, yeah, let's buy a bottle!" But this somewhat backfired on me, as you can see in the writing sample I scanned below:

Transcription:

Pilot Iroshizuku Syun-Gyo
[test scribbles] reverse writing (pretty smooth)
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog

I have very mixed feelings about Syun-Gyo on Tomoe River & Kokuyo Business papers. It somewhat starts out as a dark (already darker than I'd hoped) grape-y, wine-y red when wet, then dries to what looks like a dark reddish brown, at least in indoor lighting at 2 AM. :P From some of the swatches I'd seen before, it seemed like it would be more like a burgundy, or at least a redder/more purple shade than it is. It looks more grape-y/wine-y on Iroful, but still not the shade I was expecting. The thing is, the color it dries to on TRP/KB doesn't look bad. It's a dark-red, purple-y brown, which you'd think I'd like since I'm into odd colors & browns. And I sort of like it. But I keep remembering my expectations & becoming somewhat disappointed. But I will keep using this & see if it becomes less of a disappointment, because it's not a bad ink at all! My preconceived notions keep raining on the parade. :\

It's entirely me who's marring my enjoyment of this ink. It's stupid because even the label on the box shows the dark brownish-red/burgundy color that the ink is, so it's not like I was baited and switched. Pilot was very clear about their new offering.

Thinking back on what I wish this color were, I was expecting more like a blackened red or burgundy, or maybe an ink closer to the shade of Diamine Writer's Blood, which is weird, because I'm still not completely on board with that ink. 🤷‍♀️I think, in addition to my misconception of what this ink shade would be, I'm also not really in the mood for dark, saturated inks right now, instead preferring light, pastel neutrals – beiges, greiges, sage greens, rosy browns, taupes, and the like, even though dark colors seem more appropriate for the winter season. :smh at myself:

Well, anyway, here's a look at the ink on Tomoe River and on Iroful:

Iroful's rendering is definitely more towards the dark red/purple that I was thinking of, but even when I wrote with the ink in a pen on Iroful, that ended up leaning closer to the brown-burgundy, despite how the above writing sample looks.

I think I will eventually get over this misunderstanding and grow to really like this ink. 😅 What do you all think of it? Would you be inclined to buy a bottle, or will a generous sample be good enough for you? (I'm happy to do ink swaps.) Knowing the ink color I was expecting, do you have recommendations for other inks that might fit the bill? We can always chat here, on Mastodon, or on Bluesky about it.