Mont Blanc - James Purdey & Sons, Cigar

This ink is a collaboration between Mont Blanc and James Purdey & Sons the very very expensive British bespoke sporting guns and rifles.  I was not sure how guns would link to a a  cigar.  However, the last collaboration was ‘single malt’ and I do get the link between a single malt and a cigar.  I bought this ink from Appelboom  in the Netherlands – they were $20 cheaper a bottle than buying directly from Mont Blanc.

I could write pages and pages about cigars so will just stick to the Purdey association.
James Purdey & Sons was founded in London in 1814.  Prior to opening his business James had worked for Joseph Manton, the leading gunmaker of the time.  James’s son took over in 1858 overseeing significant change in the development and design of guns.  James the younger took out many patents for technical innovations.  In 1900 Athol Purdey took over from his father retiring in approximately 1929 being followed by his sons by his sons James and Tom.  
The business was sold to the first Baron Sherwood in 1946, the last member of the Purdey family to be involved was Richard Purdey the 6th generation who retired as Chairman in 2007.
Purdey & Sons are best known for their shot guns but they also make rifles.  The guns are custom-made with a new shotgun starting at around £90,000.  Purdey & Sons currently hold three royal warrants.

The packaging is the standard Mont Blanc box of outer hard sleeve with a drawer inside holding the ink bottle. The bottle is square glass and looks like crystal, the Mont Blanc logo is on the cap.  

​Mont Blanc call this ink James Purdey and Sons -cigar though the bottle says encre marron i.e. brown ink.  And that’s what it is.  

Let me start with the scent – I do like a cigar and I know they are very strong smelling but this smells nothing like a cigar to me.  It is not as strong as the whiskey scented ink, the scent making that ink almost un-useable for me.  However, I suspect as I use this ink the scent will become more obvious.
Chromatography and the ink is definitely brown, there is some orange in the mix so it might give the ink a lift beyond being a standard brown colour.  

On col-o-ring and Tomoe just brown, clearly this is just a brown ink with the scent of  I'm not sure what.

Col-o-ring

Tomoe

I haven’t included any pictures of dupes for this as there are so many browns out there – my closest are Diamines triple chocolate and cocoa shimmer.
For the writing I used a pen from Bonecrusher studios with a fine nib.  I started with copy paper.
I was very happy that the ink flowed immediately I used the pen, it is a nice brown but little to commend it if you are looking for some wow factor.  The scent is not strong infact I couldn’t really smell it all when writing.  Dry time very good, no feathering and no show through.  I would normally take a photo of the opposite side to the writing but honestly it looks just like a blank piece of paper.

Second paper was Midori, a bit of shading is apparent and again the scent not too obvious.  I am actually glad about that as I struggled with the single malt ink and don’t use it because of the strong scent which I don’t find at all pleasant.  Dry time again very good.

Last but by no means least Tomoe river.  Nice brown ink, minimal shading but a very good dry time for this paper.

This is a nice brown ink  but even by Mont Blanc standards expensive.  Depending on where you buy it it can be more than US$1 per ml.  Mont Blanc inks for quality are some of the best available but I wouldn’t buy it again or recommend it to others because of the price and the fact there are cheaper brown inks out there.
In summary:
Saturation – medium
Shading – minimal
Sheen - no
Flow - good
Nib dry-out - none
Nib creep – 
Start-up – immediate
Feathering – no
Drying – very quick even on Tomoe
Cleaning – easy
Water resistance – not waterproof but quite a bit remians on the paper after being put under running water