Ink Storage Tour

We finally reached 1,000 ink reviews earlier this month! I never though I’d hit that many, let alone in the first three years. I try to do a favorites post every 100 ink reviews but decided to do something a bit different this time. I took a vote on Instagram, and the #1 request was for a tour of my ink storage, so let’s go for a wander through my cabinet.

Ink Tower:

This cabinet is the Alex 9-drawer from Ikea, and is where most of my ink lives. This tower lives to the left of my desk.

I do own a lot of ink, but most of these inks have come to me in the process of reviewing inks. I occasionally take a box of ink to my local pen club to give away. The light inside isn’t the best so forgive some of the crappy lighting. Generally I take my photos outside but I can’t really move this whole tower outside.

This first drawer holds my Sailor Ink Studio samples as well as my Birmingham samples (since the glass vials don’t fit in the vial holders) and some Thornton’s Luxury Goods inks.

The next drawer holds 3 vial holders with samples divided by color: neutrals, orange/yellow and red/pink. In the front are some J Herbin, Thornton’s Luxury Goods, David Oscarson, Montblanc and Sailor Ink Studio bottles.

Drawer #3 holds another 3 vial holders: green/teals, blues and purples. Bottles are from Blackstone, Troublemaker and KWZ (If you can ever get your hands on a bottle of the KWZ Meet Me in St. Louis Butterscotch-DO IT!).

Next we’ve got Papier Plume and some random J Herbin, Montblanc, Callifolio, Noodler’s, TWSBI, De Atramentis and Colorverse.

This drawer is mainly Sailor with some Kobe and Private Reserve mixed in.

This drawer is all random: Noodler’s, Organics Studio, Rohrer and Klingner, Krishna, Vinta, Pelikan, Platinum, Cross, J Herbin, Sheaffer, Parker, Kaweco and some re-bottled Bril.

Monteverde, some overflow Robert Oster and Diamine, the Colorverse Voyager set and the Sailor Nano inks.

Robert Oster deserves his own drawer because I love his inks.

Diamine gets its own drawer, and even spills over into some other drawers. I love these 30ml bottles-I think I paid under $2 per 30ml bottle.

Here’s my Pilot Iroshizuku inks-one day I’ll own them all, some PenBBS, Lamy, Waterman, some overflow Diamine, and some Ancient Song bottles in the very back.

This is a drawer in my desk that holds inks I’m currently working on reviewing and ones I want to review soon (ones that have been sent in by retailers or readers).

Samples

After I’ve reviewed an ink if there’s any ink left in the sample then I throw it in these bins. I have one bin for neutrals, one for warm colors and one for cool colors. I try not to waste any ink, and I often search through these bins for a specific sample.

I love this Alex cabinet-it has held up really well for the past 5 years. I do put a cardboard support on the bottom of the drawers with the heaviest inks in them to prevent any sagging. You can probably tell what my favorite brands are, just based on which I own the most bottles of. My top 5 are (in no particular order): Robert Oster, Pilot Iroshizuku, Sailor, Monteverde and Diamine.

Discaimer: All photos and opinions are my own. There are no affiliate links on this page, and this post is not sponsored in any way.