Van Dieman’s Prickly Pear Dupe: the experiment

One Ink to rule them all, One Banana to find them, One Ink to bring them all and in the notebook bind them.

I know I said I wouldn’t post today, but I thankfully got power back where I’m staying. No power still at our home. I am staying in good spirits and to avert my thoughts from Milton, I am hoping you enjoy this new post.

Once upon a time, there was a young banana enthusiast who impulsively bought a bottle of Van Dieman’s Prickly Pear, arguably the best ink ever to ink. Said banana connoisseur proceeded to talk about this ink on the internet and maybe because of this, or maybe unrelated to this, Pen Chalet once — albeit briefly — brought it back.

Briefly isn’t enough, however! :shouts at the sky while waving a banana:

Devastated, heartbroken, and not at all dramatic, the nerd started looking for dupes in lieu of this gorgeous magenta super sheener, and they discovered… some interesting results.

If it wasn’t obvious, I’m the nerd, the nerd is me, and today I’ll be talking about my top picks for dupes if you can’t get your hands on the original.

Side note: when the OG Lamy Dark Lilac was exhausted, some Redditors found at least two good mixes that look like the original. One Redditor found a mix of Lamy Beryl and Azurite (4:1 ratio), another used Iroshizuku Yama Budo and Shin Kai (3:1). I am not a good mixologist so I can’t tell you I did the same while searching for the alternative for my favorite ink. Instead, I just collected inks from different manufacturers hoping I’d stumble upon a good replacement¹.

Just to clarify on what I was looking for: a magenta leaning red with a metric ton of green sheen. As in “obnoxious amount of green sheen”.

The original (RIP).

Here we go.

I learned there’s no way to take a good picture of inks so take my word for this.

Ferris Wheel Press Once Upon a Time (Song of Scarlet)

This one looks promising in the sense the shade of reddish is the closest to Prickly Pear; unfortunately, the sheen doesn’t pop for me. As there is some shimmer too, I can’t say this is the best alternative to the Prickly Pear, although the combo looks great. Thus, I am very happy I have a full bottle of this one, courtesy of a friend from Reddit.

Monarca Cardona

This beautiful ink, the bottle of which comes with the pen stand, was given to me for review purposes by Erik of Amarillo Stationery. The ink is absolutely glorious, I love it, and it immediately went on my ‘to buy again’ list. It’s closer to Colorverse Andromeda than to Prickly Pear, however, based on the sheen (more gold than green). The actual ink color is more on the purple side of magenta. I like the subtle shimmer as well.

Kiwi Inks Magenta Rainbow (with sheen and shimmer and the name is too long for me)

This one may be the closest in color I have seen and tried. The color is absolutely the same, the sheen is definitely there, it just has quite a bit of silvery (or blue?) shimmer that is a dead giveaway that the inks are not the same. I almost cried in frustration because I was so close, yet no cigar. I do enjoy its shimmery goodness and I use it often, especially in demonstrators because why not.

Sailor Studio 931

A friend (hi Issa!) gifted me this ink for the purpose of comparing it to Prickly Pear; it’s quite more violet (or… way too magenta?) than the original, and there’s no sheen to talk about, but it’s a great ink. The online photos are super deceiving in the sense you may think it’s close to Prickly Pear… but sadly, it’s not.

Wearingeul 1984

I admit this one wasn’t even supposed to be a close comparison to the original, as it’s way more on the burgundy side, and there’s shimmer, but as 1984 happens to be my favorite book, I had to test it alongside everything here. It reminds me of Sailor Oku Yama and Wearingeul Queen of Hearts, to be perfectly honest. Good color, but absolutely not even close to Prickly Pear.

Diamine Robert

This Cult Pens exclusive ink is supposed to be extremely sheeny, but it doesn’t feel too extreme to me. Moderate sheen, then? The color is just slightly too purple, and the sheen is, believe it or not, less striking than on the original. Still a beautiful ink, of course; just not close enough to Prickly Pear. You can see the sheen around the edges of the smudge.

Diamine All the Best

Okay so I am a big fan of this ink. There’s gorgeous sheen and shimmer — although the shimmer is blue — and I’d use this every day. It closely reminds me of the Kiwi Inks Rainbow Magenta thingy. Here’s a review by the one and only Mountain of Ink. Again, super close when it comes to color and sheen, but not close enough.

So, in conclusion…

After testing way too many inks, I realized that close matches are out there, but that I am also unable to find a single 100% match. I want to believe that the One still out there, waiting on my inky fingers to grab it.

It saddens me to think that once the bottle I have is exhausted, I will never be able to use this ink again; it pains me that this OG Dark Lilac of mine is gone forever. Is it time for me to start mixing inks?! What did I do to deserve this first world problem?!

I again implore Pen Chalet to totally change their business model for my sake and bring this ink back!

1. I love all of these inks, and they all have a place. I am just obsessed with finding the dupe.