Ink Review: Kuretake Ink-Cafe Meiji No Iro Ebicha

I picked up the Kuretake Ink-Cafe Meiji No Iro Bottled Ink in Ebicha (20ml bottle for $19.30) last year and have been meaning to post a review. I had been waiting to get all six colors but I can never find all in stock at the same time. The “MEIJI NO IRO” series of inks is nspired by popular colors from the Meiji era of Japanese history that occurred between 1868 to 1912, the Japanese equivalent of the Edwardian period. The full collection includes 6 colors. Ebicha is a deep reddish purple. In full coverage, it looks almost like a purple-brown. The color was purposely “sort of purple”. In the Meiji era, purple was considered a noble color used by the aristocracy. This was similar to how purple was seen in Europe as well until about 1865 when William Perkin started his experiments with coal tar and quinine to create a commercially viable mauve color (which was still expensive but started the trend of commerical dyes). Since Japanese people were afraid of using purple for home and…