There’s something about the name of this pen that makes me think of Australia.. The pen looks like it should be from Australia. Just me?

The Opus 88 Koloro is a pretty neat pen. You can get this model in four different colours: two blues, a red and a yellow. All four colour barrels come with pieces of ebonite that compliment that specific colour (the two blues differ with slightly different ebonite accents). It’s an interesting eyedropper and a pen that’s not much like any other I’ve got in my collection.

Design

The Opus 88 is an acrylic pen with ebonite, what I shall call, ornamentation. The ebonite matches the acrylic colour as a more muted compliment. For some reason this just makes me think of Australia, which is weird because the pen’s from Taiwan. I really don’t understand the link my brain is making, but there you go.

The acrylic, from what I’ve got in front of me and speaking on behalf of the other colours I’ve seen online, is a nice vibrant colour. Even coming from me, I think the red doesn’t look half bad. The ebonite really does help with the aesthetics of this pen. Top notch.

The cap is mainly ebonite, though there is a window where you can see through the cap and view the nib, which is a nice touch; I quite like the idea of that. The top of the cap is flat, as is the end cap which doesn’t make it look like a cigar shaped pen.

The clip is fairly conservative in design, seems to be ribbed on the side for her pleasure to make it a little different, though doesn’t add massively to the visual appeal as it’s not something I noticed immediately. It has silver furnishings, though I feel that on this pen if it was gold then it would be far too overbearing so this is one of the occasions where I’m glad it’s not gold. One of the few, anyway. The clip is fairly stiff, but it does the job. Not impossible to use.

The cap screws off in 3.75 turns, which is a fair number of threads. The section is the same colour as the acrylic, but not as translucent and more of a solid colour. Looks quite nice, in my opinion.

Nib

Unfortunately this is where the pen fails for me. If this was my pen I would adjust the nib so that it wrote a bit wetter. Other than that, it writes very nicely – but wetness is quite a big factor for me when it comes to the writing experience. Though, I have had worse nibs so to its credit – at least the nib actually writes and isn’t too dry.

Oddly enough, despite the dryness of the nib it actually keeps up pretty well with fast writing.

It doesn’t fair too badly with reverse writing, though it does become very dry after a while and the difference in line variation really isn’t worth it.

You can squeeze quite a bit of line variation out of this nib as well. It isn’t advertised as a flex by any means, so of course be careful.

I have an appreciation for finer nibs, so I did enjoy writing with this and I think it would be a fantastic nib if it wrote a bit wetter. It’s a steel nib and branded with Opus, though it does appear to be a Jowo nib, which tend to be reliable.

Filling

This is where the pen gets even more interesting, as this is an eyedropper. I only have one other eyedropper in my collection, which I rather enjoy. Though I haven’t been brave enough to carry it around with me just yet. The Koloro gives me a bit more confidence when carrying it around because it has a plunger (which makes it look like a piston/vacuum filler) that acts as a shut off valve. Much in the same way of a TWSBI Vac 700 or the Pilot Custom 823 you will have to unscrew the end to release the plunger and allow ink flow for long writing sessions.

As this is an eyedropper filled pen, I’m very glad that you get an actual eyedropper to fill it with. Syringes work well, but unless you’ve got one with you, you’re sort of stuck without the supplied eyedropper. So it’s good that this is supplied. The presentation box is also very nice that holds the pen and eyedropper.

Feel

Not an oversize pen, but a respectable size. It fits very nicely in my hands. It’s also not very heavy but nicely weighted – especially when you’ve got it inked up. If you wish, you can post the pen. Here are a few size comparisons:

I also find the section very comfortable. It’s slightly tapered and quite long. The threads aren’t at all sharp and you hardly feel them.

Price

This pen retails for $93 and I don’t think it’s available within the UK. I don’t think it’s an extortionate price, given that the pen is aesthetically pleasing, holds a large ink capacity and isn’t a standard cartridge/converter and the writing experience (bar the slightly dry nib) is very nice. I’m not going to dwell over the fact that the nib is more on the dry side at this price point because it’s an easy fix and it’s not like the pen didn’t write at all.

For an additional $27 you can get the pen in a demonstrator model. I’m not sure why the premium, as from the pictures I don’t think it has the ebonite as the regular models have, and I thought this would be an additional cost, rather than not having it. But it is what it is.

Would I buy it?

Initially, I was on the fence about this pen. In fact, I don’t think I clicked with it straight away. However, after getting to use it more and appreciate the aesthetic, this is a pen that could find its way into my collection one day. Perhaps not in the red design, though.

Disclaimer: This product was sent to me on behalf of Pen Chalet in exchange for an honest review. All views expressed are my own.