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New VS Old Parker Blue-Black

Some of you may have already heard this but I thought it’s a good thing to know nonetheless. Parker recently updated their lineup of pens and inks. This means that ink swabs around the internet no longer represent what you might get in the store. Luckily it’s fairly easy to tell the new ink apart from the old one because the boxes have been redesigned.

As you can see from the pictures, the old Parker Quink Blue Black had a green/teal color while the new formulation this time around is actually blue instead of green, however I wouldn’t necessarily call the new color a blue-black. So until the old stock clears from all retailers you might end up with the old bottle or vice versa, you might want to get the old teal colored Blue-Black but you’ll end up with the new formulation.

LEFT: Old / RIGHT: New

It’s also interesting to note that Parker and Waterman share the same parent company and if you look at it closely the new Parker Blue-Black looks suspiciously similar to the Waterman Mysterious Blue. I’ll post the two ink swabs side by side and I’ll let you decide whether they are the same inks or not.

We also had a conversation about this over at The Fountain Pen Network, if you’re interested to see what others think, you can also check out the thread here. I’d still love to hear your thoughts in the old and new Parker Blue-Blacks. Which do you like better? Is the new Parker the same as the Waterman Mysterious Blue?