Van Dieman's Tassie Seasons Pack - Summer

About Tassie Seasons

Tassie Seasons is the fifth series in Van Dieman's expanding collection of Tasmanian Fountain Pen Inks. These sixteen inks encapsulate the changing colours of Tasmania, with four inks dedicated to each season. Tassie Seasons is a mix of dark and light, warm and cool, every-day writing worthy and artistically minded colours, including two shimmer inks.

Tasmania is the only state in Australia with a truly temperate climate. Winter exhibits colourful festivals in the south, generous snowfalls in the central highlands, and foggy days in Launceston from July through to September. Cool and breezy spring days unveil a kaleidoscope of native flowers, vibrantly plumed birds and stunning butterflies. An abundance of local produce arrives in the summer, to be enjoyed with a day at the many beaches, and followed by the ominous summer storm. In Autumn enjoy late seasons figs and pepperberries and marvel at Australia's only native deciduous tree at the turning of the fagus.

Hailstorm

The menacing and imposing grey of a thunderstorm approaching is enough on its own to send a shudder down one's spine, but is all the more foreboding when it is accompanied by an ominous green hue. This ink pays homage to this awe-inspiring site in nature, which is all too common in the late afternoon of a Tasmanian Summer. This ink shades from a light khaki green to a deep, dark, near black, perfectly matched to any wet writing pen for a dark alternative to an everyday writer, and beautifully utilized in brushwork and ink washing.

Tassie Salmon

Nowhere in the world is Salmon farmed in such extreme conditions, as the southern seas off the coast of Tasmania. With nothing but open ocean for a thousand miles to Antarctica, and a global circumnavigation on either side, one feels like they have stepped off the edge of the world. These rough and tumultuous, yet extraordinarily fertile seas produce the most incredibly delicious salmon in the world. We want to pay tribute to this amazing produce that Tasmania cultivates. This ink is a pinky red with amazing shading qualities, designed with artists in mind, but beautiful in a medium to broad nibbed pen.

Tiger Snake

Tiger Snake is an ink that was as close as possible to the golden yellow-brown stripes that give the Tasmanian Tiger Snake its name. Just as how this colour allows its namesake to camouflage perfectly with the dry foliage of the summer wilds and swamps, this colour is perfectly used in drawing and painting leaves, grasses and a wide variety of elements in landscape. Darker than the average yellow, lighter than any brown, and more dynamic than the average olive or khaki shade, we were inspired by this beautiful creature to create an ink that is a beautiful golden rich brown, bordering on yellow. It is a versatile colour, muted, soft and androgynous, with more dimension than other secular light brown inks, and was used to great extent in the artwork for the Tassie Seasons. It mimics the Tasmanian Tiger Snake's distinct yellow/brown stripes, which embodies Tasmania.

Wineglass Bay

Wineglass bay holds a special place in the heart of any Tasmanian, or anyone for that matter, who has visited there. Nestled between sea, sand, forest and mountains, taking 2 hours to walk from the nearest road, this enchanted cove is one of earth's last remaining truly pristine locations. Its still, azure waters lap at the snow-white beaches with serene nonchalance. This blue ink is lighter than any blue from the previous Van Dieman's Series, save for Pixie Parasols. It shades beautifully to a pale cyan and holds a fine red sheen on certain paper types.